In Depth

In Depth

Enterprise software

• Trust and openness vital to get benefits from supply chain automation

  Supply chain automation is benefiting from new technological developments, such as blockchain, 5G and machine learning – as companies such as Maersk, Opel and Nestlé are proving  Continue Reading

• Shell CTO Yuri Sebregts talks about using AI to amplify the human impact of its workforce

  Digital transformation is a multi-decade process for Shell, with artificial intelligence presenting the oil and gas giant with new opportunities to ramp up the productivity of its workforce, its CTO explains  Continue Reading

• OpenStack storage update 2018: After Rocky

  Snapshots and container storage support are among recently added functionality in the open source private cloud platform, but vendor driver support for OpenStack is not universal  Continue Reading

• Intelligent automation and the WAN: Is SD-WAN moving mainstream?

  Take-up of software-defined networking in corporates is slower than expected. Where have we reached on the journey to software-controlled networks – and SD-WAN in particular – becoming the norm?  Continue Reading

• Colocation and the hyperscalers: What the cloud giants want in a datacentre partner

  The colocation market is booming on the back of the growing demand from the hyperscale cloud giants for readily available datacentre capacity, but why are some operators more successful than others when it comes to landing their business?  Continue Reading

• Mobile-first strategy rings true for jeweller

  Mobile has played a key role in how London jeweller Taylor & Hart has changed the rules for buying a ring  Continue Reading

• Doorstep challenge: How retailers are innovating on delivery and fulfilment

  Every retailer selling online in 2018 needs great shipping options for customers who have got used to an expanding list of choices. How are some retailers developing the proposition, and where does technology fit into the equation?  Continue Reading

• How is Google taking on Microsoft Office in retail?

  Carrefour represents a big-name contract win for Google’s G Suite, but will Microsoft Office still be dominant across retail?  Continue Reading

• Flash storage in the cloud from the big cloud providers

  We survey the big three cloud providers – AWS, Azure and Google – and find a range of mostly block storage flash storage options with performance choices available  Continue Reading

• Employers turn to wearable technology to help staff manage work-life balance

  Companies are realising that there are sound business reasons for ensuring their employees get enough sleep and exercise, so they are turning to wearable technology to help their staff stay healthy, despite the pressures of work  Continue Reading

• Blockchain delivers value with food sourcing system

  Blockchain systems for food and drink are proving their value with tuna fishing, fresh food supply, and ecologically sound food sourcing  Continue Reading

• How the big five storage array makers tier data to the cloud

  We look at the big five storage array makers' efforts to connect on-premise hardware with cloud storage and find automated tiering, on-ramps, and backup and archive capability  Continue Reading

• The use cases, challenges and benefits behind retail AI

  Retailers have been collecting customer data for years, and with AI technology now available to help them use it effectively, they’re jumping at the chance – but what challenges lie ahead?  Continue Reading

• DevOps and containers: How to get connected

  We look at how to apply a DevOps approach to a container-based microservices architecture  Continue Reading

• Virtual storage appliances in the cloud from the big five

  We survey the big five storage hardware makers’ cloud offerings. Virtual storage appliances available range from storage and backup/data protection to nothing at all  Continue Reading

• Nigel Shadbolt on why the UK is well placed to lead on the ethics of AI

  Nigel Shadbolt, principal of Jesus College, Oxford and co-founder of the Open Data Institute, underscores the ethics of artificial intelligence, and says it will shape the naked ape as tools always have  Continue Reading

• National Archives races to create electronic archive of EU law before Brexit

  The National Archives faces challenges converting the EU's enormous library of laws into a publicly accessible UK archive ahead of Brexit. The Archives’ digital director, John Sheridan, explains how  Continue Reading

• Tips on reducing unnecessary cloud service costs

  As IT departments prepare their 2019 budgets, we assess how to avoid paying too much for cloud services  Continue Reading

• Inside DevOps, containers and enterprise security

  Global corporates are waking up to containers and orchestrated containerisation for software development that is fast and safe. Computer Weekly looks at the best approach to ensure security is not compromised along the way  Continue Reading

• Hybrid cloud a key milestone on the road to cloud storage

  The cloud seems to lend itself to use as a storage location. There are lots of bumps in the road, however, and hybrid cloud should be a key medium-term aim for organisations  Continue Reading

• Servitisation: What it is and how it can transform companies

  The idea that every product-based company needs to put service first is a radical shift in how businesses organise themselves. Is it more than rhetoric?  Continue Reading

• Interview: Dame Stephanie ‘Steve’ Shirley: 'Scared silly' by Brexit

  Renowned entrepreneur and philanthropist Steve Shirley talks robots teaching children, and why Brexit has her “scared silly”  Continue Reading

• Future tech cannot be ‘defined by a particular population’, says CA executive

  As new technologies are developed, companies could take the opportunity to hire more diversely to ensure offerings cater to a wider demographic  Continue Reading

• Has collaboration software wrought perilous communication overload?

  A new generation of collaborative software, such as Slack and Microsoft Teams, could prove a knowledge management boon. But does it have a dark side of communication overload?  Continue Reading

• Data protection for containers: Why and how to do Docker backup

  Containers such as those from Docker are agile, lightweight and can be short-lived, but they and their data often need to be protected. We look at the key options available  Continue Reading

• Streamline infrastructure management through robotic automation

  Robotic automation is changing the infrastructure management game, helping IT departments make fewer mistakes and boost their productivity  Continue Reading

• Guinness World Records bets on Office 365 and AWS to boost business expansion

  Rob Howe, director of IT at Guinness World Records, opens up about how cloud is supporting the organisation’s ongoing push to diversify its business  Continue Reading

• Enhance efficiency by automating IT services

  We look at the role of artificial intelligence and chatbots in IT service management  Continue Reading

• DevOps done right: Securing grassroots support for a top-down DevOps enterprise push

  As more and more enterprises rush to join the DevOps movement, practitioners share details of how they secured grassroots support for their senior leadership team's top-down agile adoption mandates  Continue Reading

• Cloud HCI survey: Cloud functionality in hyper-converged infrastructure

  We look at how you can use hyper-converged infrastructure to build private clouds and link up with public cloud services to develop hybrid and multi-cloud working  Continue Reading

• Why AI must move beyond pattern-matching

  Artificial intelligence and deep learning have revolutionised applications such as computer vision, but more complex problems require a different approach  Continue Reading

• Containers and storage: Array suppliers’ container capabilities

  We look at what the big five storage array makers – Dell EMC, Hitachi, HPE, IBM and NetApp – are doing to provide persistent storage for container-based deployments  Continue Reading

• Let automation take away the tedium

  Computer Weekly looks at how far the suppliers of systems management tools and associated products have progressed with automation  Continue Reading

• Cloud storage: Amazon vs Azure vs Google vs IBM Softlayer

  Computer Weekly looks at the biggest four cloud storage providers, how they stand in the market, the products they offer, and which offers the widest range of products and features  Continue Reading

• Manufacturers, technology and the fourth industrial revolution

  A look at some of the innovations and technology investment focus areas for today’s manufacturing industry  Continue Reading

• Adapting to the rise of the holistic application

  A containerised, componentised and compartmentalised approach to software presents CIOs with the challenge of managing a more complex environment  Continue Reading

• Assessing the hyperscale squeeze on G-Cloud's SMEs

  The latest government spend data suggests public sector IT buyers are increasingly using G-Cloud to procure services from the hyperscale cloud community, prompting concerns about the impact this might have on the SME-friendly framework  Continue Reading

• Ethical AI requires collaboration and framework development

  Countries and companies are attending to the ethics of artificial intelligence technology use. Such efforts need to be collectively determined to result in solid frameworks  Continue Reading

• Making sense of Microsoft’s cloud developer platform

  We assess how Microsoft is aligning its development tools to support Linux and open source, in light of its acquisition of GitHub  Continue Reading

• IPsoft’s digital worker is part of a shift in human productivity

  IPsoft used its annual user summit to allow customers to update themselves on the career of its cognitive digital agent Amelia  Continue Reading

• Is DevOps the best approach to software development?

  A DevOps model builds on an agile approach to software development, but a different approach to tooling is needed  Continue Reading

• Canada’s tech sector is targeting Europe – does it have what it takes to compete?

  Following its free-trade agreement with the EU – and the contrast with its noisy neighbour – Canada is promoting its tech sector to European IT buyers. We take a look at what CIOs can expect  Continue Reading

• Cloud NAS offers file access across on-site and in-cloud

  We run the rule over cloud NAS products that allow customers to build single-namespace file systems, including between in-house datacentres and public cloud storage  Continue Reading

• Lessons from GE’s flight to digital platforms

  Examining the challenges industrial giant GE  has encountered on its digital journey and the lessons learned for CIOs heading in the same direction  Continue Reading

• WD-40 oils sales and finance processes in Europe with Epicor

  WD-40 has automated its business processes with Epicor ERP, finding the system’s service-oriented architecture good for providing flexibility in the company’s business growth  Continue Reading

• AI elevates predictive maintenance for Kone and ThyssenKrupp

  Kone and ThyssenKrupp are using artificial intelligence to improve predictive maintenance of their lifts and escalators  Continue Reading

• How artificial intelligence is fuelling engine maintenance innovation at Rolls-Royce

  The engine maker has established an innovation centre to enable the company to deliver analytics and artificial intelligence-powered services to airlines using Rolls-Royce engines  Continue Reading

• CW500: The advent of AI

  For better or worse, artificial intelligence is one of the most talked-about technologies today, and it is here to stay. The latest CW500 Club investigated what AI actually is and the opportunities it can offer  Continue Reading

• Chatbots demonstrate unexpected range of uses, from mental health to education

  Chatbots, software that uses normal language to communicate with people through text or voice, are proving their value in a surprising variety of ways – from accountancy support to mental health  Continue Reading

• Enterprise accessibility: How Cray is using HPC to open up AI use cases from the datacentre

  Enterprises interest in HPC is reportedly being fuelled by the rising demand for artificial intelligence-based applications and services, and Cray is one of a number of providers looking to cash in  Continue Reading

• Congolese health workers and patients benefit from Couchbase database

  Belgian public health consulting firm AEDES has worked with a local partner in the Democratic Republic of Congo to deliver a health information management system based on Couchbase  Continue Reading

• GDPR: An overview of the latest data protection legislation

  The forthcoming General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will have wide-ranging implications for every organisation that processes personal data. This comprehensive overview tells you what you need to know  Continue Reading

• How SAP’s digital access licence influences your ERP strategy

  Following the high-profile legal cases against brewers Diageo and Anheuser-Busch InBev, SAP has brought some clarity over indirect access to its core ERP system  Continue Reading

• Assessing Alibaba Cloud

  AWS, Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud Platform rule the public cloud market – but Chinese IaaS challenger Alibaba is targeting world domination  Continue Reading

• Siemens success sets the scene for growth in process mining

  German industrial conglomerate Siemens has turned to process mining to reveal inefficiencies in the way it pays suppliers, organises logistics and runs order-to-cash processes  Continue Reading

• A history of cloud computing

  The history of cloud computing starts way back in the 1960s, when an “intergalactic computer network” was first suggested, and in recent years the technology has served to shake-up both the enterprise IT and supplier landscape.  Continue Reading

• The ins and outs of cloud portability

  Public cloud portability comes in many forms – the secret is to research and plan appropriately  Continue Reading

• Silicon Valley startups pitch in to the remaking of corporate IT

  Enterprise IT is being remade by DevOps, cloud, containerisation and the incursion of AI. We look at one group of Silicon Valley-based suppliers attacking different vectors of new model IT  Continue Reading

• Inside Red Hat’s open culture

  The open source stalwart’s culture of transparency, openness and collaboration has been instrumental to its success as one of the world’s most successful software companies  Continue Reading

• How Australian enterprises are unifying business communications

  Business leaders and experts in rolling out unified communications tools in Australia stress the importance of change management and employee consultation to avoid digital white elephants  Continue Reading

• How to find the right mobility strategy for your SME

  Small businesses still need a strategy to make the most of mobility, so what should business owners look out for?  Continue Reading

• ASEAN’s growing appetite for unified communications

  Led by enterprises in Singapore and Malaysia, adoption of unified communications tools is expected to grow with the surge in demand for cloud-based and hosted offerings  Continue Reading

• How to make the leap from traditional bank to digital bank

  To compete effectively in an increasingly digital financial landscape, conventional banks need to build greater efficiency, value and trust through technology  Continue Reading

• How artificial intelligence can aid and replace higher order human creativity

  Much is made of AI augmenting human intelligence with simple automation, but might higher order human creativity go the same way?  Continue Reading

• The bitcoin boom: How colocation datacentres are cashing in on cryptocurrency mining

  Cryptocurrency miners are turning to colocation providers to help scale up their operations, drive profits and boost their resiliency, but the benefits could be relatively short-lived for all concerned, it seems  Continue Reading

• Customer experience must be digital focus for banks

  Omni-channel technologies can help banks stand out from their rivals, but a good customer experience should be their goal  Continue Reading

• Silicon Valley startups home in on pressing value from data

  A slew of California-based startup and early-stage data analytics companies are promising CIOs better ways to get value from their investments in databases and analytics  Continue Reading

• Hybrid cloud file and object pushes the frontiers of storage

  A single environment across on-premise and cloud environments is possible with a new class of product that builds file systems and object stores with hybrid cloud  Continue Reading

• Assessing the disparate initiatives tackling the UK’s technology skills gap

  As the UK’s skills gap widens, initiatives aim to ensure the population has the skills needed for roles now and in the future, but are these disparate efforts helping or hindering the cause?  Continue Reading

• Why the browser is the computer

  When he was CEO of Sun Microsystems, Scott McNealy once said that the network is the computer. Today, users spend most of their time in a browser  Continue Reading

• Inside the distros: A year in Linux development

  Linux will turn 30 in three years. We look at how far the major Linux distributions – or distros – have come over the past year and what they might be able to bring in the future  Continue Reading

• Have traditional banks weathered the fintech challenge?

  How will the financial technology-based challenger banks evolve as the traditional retail banking industry ups its digital game?  Continue Reading

• ASEAN enterprises readying networks for the cloud era

  Enterprise networks are being strained by greater use of cloud computing, leading more ASEAN organisations to turn to SD-WAN to reduce network costs and complexity  Continue Reading

• Customer analytics applications add artificial intelligence to reduce market ‘friction’

  Customer analytics applications developers are seeking to add layers of intelligence to improve sellers’ interactions with buyers  Continue Reading

• Machines delve deep into customer minds

  Deep learning can help customer insight teams advance rapidly in their mission to understand their customers  Continue Reading

• What are the retail jobs that don’t exist yet?

  As in many industries, technology and new consumer behaviour is changing the shape of retail. But what yet-to-be-created jobs are on the horizon for the sector?  Continue Reading

• Cloud DR: Key choices in cloud disaster recovery

  Flexibility and low cost make the cloud well-suited to disaster recovery, but there is no one-size-fits-all route to cloud disaster recovery. We look at the key choices  Continue Reading

• Put the customer first and reap the reward

  How businesses can develop a granular understanding of their customers’ needs in a hyper-connected world  Continue Reading

• Chrome OS: Why it may be time to approach desktop IT in a different way

  The managed desktop has been running for nearly 20 years. Surely there must be a better way? We investigate  Continue Reading

• Data Lab CEO Gillian Docherty on how data can boost Scottish economy

  Gillian Docherty, CEO of The Data Lab, outlines the organisation’s mission to turn analytics and artificial intelligence to benefit Scotland’s economy  Continue Reading

• How AI will underpin cyber security in the next few years

  Cyber security risks are growing in complexity and volume, but artificial intelligence techniques can help businesses track and fight them in real time  Continue Reading

• Smart security: Go beyond the basics with biometrics

  With smartphone makers offering new features such as biometrics, there are lots of options available to businesses when putting mobile security into practice  Continue Reading

• Are you human? How to defeat the bots in e-commerce

  Theatres and other entertainment venues are in a constant war with ticket fraudsters commanding botnet armies, as are other purveyors of high-value, limited-edition goods  Continue Reading

• Organised thinking builds app success

  We look at how large enterprises can create an efficient organisational structure for mobile app development  Continue Reading

• Developers at the mobile edge

  We look at the challenges and opportunities to be found in creating mobile apps for an expanding array of devices  Continue Reading

• Shell downstream CIO Craig Walker: Invest time in your team

  Craig Walker, CIO for Shell’s global downstream business, says IT leaders need to invest time in their teams and take them and the business on any change journey  Continue Reading

• Do website design platforms pose too big a security risk?

  Cloud-based website design platforms are booming in popularity because of their simplicity and affordability, but business security should be considered carefully when using such services  Continue Reading

• Private cloud storage 101: Key components and hardware options

  Private cloud makes consumption of storage easier for the user and simplifies delivery for the IT department. We walk through the key components and the platform choices  Continue Reading

• Inside DBS Bank’s digital journey

  The Singapore-based bank laid the foundation for its digital strategy a decade ago, starting with an overhaul of its IT systems before going big on cloud computing in later years  Continue Reading

• Storage in containers: The answer to persistent storage needs?

  With compute requirements often fragmented, short-lived and bursty, traditional storage architectures can struggle to cope – so is storage in containers the solution?  Continue Reading

• In the know: how a digital workspace can drive innovation

  In a digital world, engaged employees can support innovation using a new generation of tools that leverage behavioural science and more  Continue Reading

• Smart speakers open new windows into customer behaviour for CRM

  Voice recognition has become a new frontier for customer relationship management. What does the new voice channel mean for understanding consumers and how will voice data integrate with existing customer intelligence?  Continue Reading

• Storage briefing: The evolution of software-defined storage

  The evolution of software-defined storage, from simple software products to those that offer scale-out, hyper-converged, NVMe, public cloud and container functionality  Continue Reading

• How Southeast Asia is keeping pace with AI

  Forward-looking organisations in the region are embracing artificial intelligence, but uneven access to connectivity and a lack of skills and understanding of the technology are holding back wider adoption  Continue Reading

• Cloud-to-cloud backup: What it is and why you need it

  Applications that run in the cloud are protected, but only so much. For full protection of data generated by cloud-based apps you need cloud-to-cloud backup  Continue Reading

• The death of the mainframe is greatly exaggerated, says CA

  With mainframe software tools forming a key part of its overall growth strategy, CA Technologies remains proud of its mainframe heritage  Continue Reading

• Build IoT apps the easy way

  CIOs may find themselves spoilt for choice when assessing digital platforms for IoT. We look at the options  Continue Reading

• Key choices in Docker container storage deployment

  Containers often need persistent storage, but how do you achieve that? We look at the key options, including Docker volumes versus bind mounts, and Docker Volume Plugins  Continue Reading

• From consumers to contributors: The evolution of open source in the enterprise

  The use of open source software is commonplace in enterprises, but many organisations are still reluctant to contribute their own code, despite the benefits it can bring  Continue Reading

• How Cyient streamlined its HR functions with the cloud

  The India-based supplier of engineering services is counting on a cloud-based human resource management system to improve efficiency and support its growing business  Continue Reading