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Business applications

May 31, 2011 31 May'11
Case study: Invensys saves £546,000 with SMS tokens for 150,000 users

Engineering firm Invensys is embarking on a global roll-out of software-based tokens from SecurEnvoy to replace physical token-based authentication.
May 31, 2011 31 May'11
Google Chrome OS keeps focus on notebooks despite tablet explosion

Google will keep the focus of its Chrome operating system on notebooks rather than tablets for now, according to a senior executive at the search company.
May 27, 2011 27 May'11
DWP prepares alternative to identity cards for Universal Credit

The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) is grooming a British tech start-up to play a key role in its £2bn Universal Credit benefits system.
May 26, 2011 26 May'11
Chrome OS not as secure as it looks, says Trend Micro

Google's Chrome operating system is not as secure at it might look at first glance, says Rik Ferguson, director of security research at Trend Micro.

May 26, 2011 26 May'11
Microsoft launches online Marketplace app store

Microsoft is to launch an online version of its Windows Phone mobile application store, Marketplace.
May 26, 2011 26 May'11
Data warehouse and business intelligence projects fail to meet companies' requirements

Over half of businesses gave their business intelligence and data warehouse projects a rating of "average" when asked how well they met business objectives.
May 26, 2011 26 May'11
Twinfield offers mileage accounting on iPhone

Online accounting services provider Twinfield has created an iPhone application that will enable users to automatically record time and mileage. Available as a free download from the Apple AppStore, the app uses global positioning to track mileage.
May 26, 2011 26 May'11
Analytical tools for measuring customer sentiment

Businesses often use a set of multiple-choice questions to gather customers' views on the company, yet the most interesting customer feedback generally appears in free text form. How can businesses analyse this data?
May 25, 2011 25 May'11
Microsoft previews Mango update of Windows Phone 7 OS

The next major version of the Windows Phone operating system (OS), code-named Mango, has been unveiled by Microsoft.
May 24, 2011 24 May'11
Bloomberg survey reveals CIOs plan to spend more

Over three-quarters of CIOs at global financial services companies expect to spend more money on IT in the next 12 months, with managed services, compliance and the cloud favoured for increased investment, according to research from Bloomberg.

May 23, 2011 23 May'11
Mozilla releases Firefox 5 beta for testing

Mozilla has released a beta version of the fifth version of the Firefox web browser for downloading and testing.
May 23, 2011 23 May'11
Video: Graphics processors power hybrid computing

The power of graphics processors is being exploited by software companies and researchers to run tasks once the preserve of supercomputer and high-performance graphics workstation. As Cliff Saran discovers, this technology is becoming increasingly ...
May 20, 2011 20 May'11
Salesforce.com gains 5,400 customers but profit slumps by 97%

Salesforce.com posted a 97% profit slump since last year despite its subscription-based CRM software growing to be used by over 97,000 companies.
May 20, 2011 20 May'11
SAP says cloud-based SaaS is ready for UK primetime

Business ByDesign, SAP's cloud-based software-as-a-service offering, is ready for the primetime, the enterprise software company says.
May 20, 2011 20 May'11
LinkedIn’s $10bn stock valuation raises fears of second technology bubble

Social networking site LinkedIn's stock market valuation of $10bn (£6bn) has raised concerns of a new tech bubble.
May 20, 2011 20 May'11
Red Hat boosts Enterprise Linux virtualisation performance with 6.1 update

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.1 is now available.
May 19, 2011 19 May'11
Government outlines plans for identity assurance services

The government has outlined plans for identity assurance services to be used across all online public sector services.
May 19, 2011 19 May'11
London Stock Exchange averages 100 microsecond trades

The London Stock Exchange (LSE) completes trades in just over 100 microseconds on average as its latest core trading system beds in.
May 19, 2011 19 May'11
Microsoft attempts to cement Azure values at TechEd Atlanta

"Cloud Power Delivered" is the subtitle of this year's Microsoft TechEd conference, held in Atlanta and attended by around 10,000 IT professionals and developers. Tim Anderson reports from the event.
May 19, 2011 19 May'11
SAP highlights customer experiences of in-memory computing at Sapphire Now

SAP's high-performance analytic appliance (HANA) for in-memory computing is central to the company's immediate plans, says Vishal Sikka, executive board member, technology & innovation at SAP.
May 19, 2011 19 May'11
Compuware tackles poor mobile web and app performance

Compuware has extended its Gomez application performance management (APM) to enable developers to optimise the mobile web and mobile apps.
May 19, 2011 19 May'11
Nokia’s sales hit 14-year low as worldwide smartphone sales soar

Nokia's worldwide market share of mobile devices dropped to the lowest level since 1997, according to research from Gartner.
May 19, 2011 19 May'11
Sony reset suffers setback after security flaw discovered

Sony has been forced to suspend the PlayStation Network (PSN) and Qriocity password reset web pages after discovering a flaw that could be exploited by hackers....
May 19, 2011 19 May'11
SuiteWorld 2011: How will software-as-a-service change the IT department?

CIOs are aware of the benefits of SaaS applications as being faster, better, cheaper. But how will the reduction in IT costs change the IT department? Jenny Williams investigates.
May 18, 2011 18 May'11
SuSE becomes separate Attachmate division

SuSE will be run as a separate company under Attachmate, which acquired SuSE as part of its purchase of Novell, which completed in April.
May 18, 2011 18 May'11
HP grows business 1% in Q2 but corporate products and services take off

HP's latest financial results show corporate users are still buying enterprise IT products and services.
May 18, 2011 18 May'11
Missing opportunities the real risk for business, says SAP UK

Not taking advantage of the opportunities enabled by emerging technologies is a greater risk to business than the technologies themselves, says Tim Noble, SAP managing director for UK and Ireland.
May 17, 2011 17 May'11
SAP co-chiefs highlight innovation at Sapphire 2011

SAP's co-chief executives have highlighted in-memory computing, mobile access to data and people-centric collaboration applications at the SAP Sapphire Now 2011 conference.
May 17, 2011 17 May'11
SAP expands partnership with Dell in cloud and in-memory computing

SAP has announced that it has joined forces with Dell
May 17, 2011 17 May'11
Government vigilance steps up after George Osborne reveals extent of cyber attacks

Security experts have called for UK government departments to be vigilant after chancellor George Osborne revealed that 20,000 e-mails are sent by hostile intelligence agencies to the UK government each month.
May 17, 2011 17 May'11
IBM qualification courses rolled out in Scottish universities

IBM has introduced qualification courses for its Power systems and System z mainframes throughout Scottish universities and colleges.
May 13, 2011 13 May'11
Government website pilot points to future public sector software development

Alpha.gov.uk is a pilot for a website that could put all UK government digital services and websites on one URL
May 12, 2011 12 May'11
Analysis: Will Android dominance increase IT security threats for business?

The Android Market is forecast to become the world's biggest mobile content platform by August 2011, according to research by mobile application research firm Distimo.
May 11, 2011 11 May'11
Ford uses Google Prediction to analyse driver behaviour

Developers at car maker Ford are using Google's cloud-based Prediction engine to analyse driving behaviour.
May 09, 2011 09 May'11
Leeds city deploys voice analytics to optimise callcentre

Leeds City Council is using speech analysis technology in its callcentre.
May 09, 2011 09 May'11
UK prisons use digital healthcare records system

The healthcare records of UK offenders are now available electronically, following the completion of an electronic healthcare records system across 136 prisons.
May 06, 2011 06 May'11
Stena ships websites to Microsoft Sharepoint 2010

Shipping giant Stena has moved its website content management systems to Microsoft SharePoint 2010 make it easier to launch new websites.
May 05, 2011 05 May'11
Apple releases iPhone and iPad software update to fix user location tracking

Apple has pushed out a software update to fix a location-tracking bug on its iPhone and iPad devices.
May 05, 2011 05 May'11
Enterprise software market growth heralds recovery, says Gartner

The worldwide enterprise software market grew 8.5% to $245b in 2010, signalling a recovery from the recession, says research firm Gartner.
May 03, 2011 03 May'11
CIOs must start planning for HTML 5.0 now

The browser has become the single piece of software most widely deployed and used. Apple, Microsoft, Google and Firefox's Mozilla are in a race to develop more functional browsers. The core functionality of these browsers must be the same to comply ...
April 29, 2011 29 Apr'11
Microsoft reports record third quarter financial results

Microsoft has announced record results for its financial third quarter, delivering a riposte to critics who say the software giant is losing its lustre.
April 28, 2011 28 Apr'11
HP wins $2.5bn deal to support 60,000 NASA staff

NASA has signed an IT services contract with HP for computer services and devices for 60,000 workers.
April 28, 2011 28 Apr'11
Strong identity key to collaboration and cloud, says Jericho Forum

Strong identity is essential to cloud-based services, but many businesses and technology suppliers are barking up the wrong tree, say security experts.
April 28, 2011 28 Apr'11
University Hospital Birmingham delivers mobile enterprise

University Hospital Birmingham (UHB) is presenting next week at Blackberry World in the US, on how it has made enterprise applications available to clinicians...
April 28, 2011 28 Apr'11
SAP still not delivering on its vision despite strong Q1 results

Enterprise software maker SAP has reported a 26% growth in software revenue to €583m and 20% growth in software and software related service revenue to €2.3bn,...
April 28, 2011 28 Apr'11
Apple blames bug for tracking users' location

Apple has blamed a bug for surreptitiously tracking iPhone and iPad users' locations and has promised to release free software to remedy the problem in the...
April 28, 2011 28 Apr'11
PlayStation Network credit card information was encrypted, says Sony

Sony has reiterated its statement that there is no evidence that credit card data was taken by hackers who forced the company to suspend...
April 27, 2011 27 Apr'11
CIO interview: BAA chief information officer Philip Langsdale

The chief information officer at the airport operator talks exclusively with Computer Weekly about making the move to an outsourcing provider, handling disruptions and keeping IT running smoothly.
April 26, 2011 26 Apr'11
Can Oracle kill off Itanium?

At the end of March, Oracle announced it would no longer be developing its software for the Intel Itanium chip.
April 26, 2011 26 Apr'11
Adobe patches critical vulnerabilities in Reader and Acrobat

Adobe has released special out-of-cycle security updates to patch critical vulnerabilities in Adobe Reader and Acrobat X (10.0.2) and earlier 10.x and 9.x versions for Windows and Mac.
April 21, 2011 21 Apr'11
Centrica outsources software testing

Utility giant Centrica is taking advantage of onshore and offshore software testing skills through an £8m deal with SQS.
April 21, 2011 21 Apr'11
National Archives scoops Queen’s Award for Enterprise

The National Archives has been awarded the Queen's Award for Enterprise - the first public sector body to receive the gong in more than ten years.
April 20, 2011 20 Apr'11
Audi puts SAP in IBM private cloud

IBM has built a private cloud to host Audi's SAP infrastructure ....
April 20, 2011 20 Apr'11
Business intelligence spending on the up

Sales of Business Intelligence software were worth $10.5bn in 2010 with SAP once again selling the most...
April 19, 2011 19 Apr'11
Infosec 2011: Security software among the most insecure applications, study reveals

Two-thirds of software industry applications fail to meet acceptable security quality upon initial submission, a study of 4,800 applications has revealed.
April 18, 2011 18 Apr'11
Growth of NFC to drive overhaul of Chip and PIN equipment

The growth of near-field communication (NFC) in the UK will drive the replacement of retailers' Chip and PIN point of sale (PoS) equipment, according to an analyst.
April 18, 2011 18 Apr'11
Microsoft Office 365 available in beta

Microsoft's Office 365 cloud service is now online as a public beta, together with an online marketplace for apps and professional services.
April 18, 2011 18 Apr'11
Compliance tops security agenda

Regulatory compliance will be the top business issue affecting enterprise IT in the next 12 to 18 months, according to security group ISACA.
April 15, 2011 15 Apr'11
Apple iOS 4.3.2 update available to download

Apple has released its latest 4.3.2 update for mobile operating system, iOS.
April 15, 2011 15 Apr'11
Computer Weekly marks the end of an era as a new one begins

The first issue of Computer Weekly magazine in 1966 marked the start of an era in the UK IT industry - the first ever weekly technology publication. This is the story of how it all began.
April 15, 2011 15 Apr'11
Google share price falls after operational costs outstrip sales gain

Google has reported a sharp rise in first-quarter earnings with co-founder Larry Page back as chief executive, but investors were unimpressed
April 14, 2011 14 Apr'11
Blaby District Council signs £1.3m contract with Steria

Blaby District Council in Leicester has signed a shared services agreement with Steria for £1.3m over five years.
April 14, 2011 14 Apr'11
Adobe announces quick release of patches for latest critical flaw in Flash Player

Adobe has updated its advisory about the latest critical vulnerability in Flash Player with expected dates for patch releases.
April 14, 2011 14 Apr'11
Qatar University signs deal with Mahindra Satyam for ERP contract

Qatar University has signed a deal with Mahindra Satyam, formerly Satyam Computer Services, for a large Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) contract.
April 13, 2011 13 Apr'11
Microsoft launches UK mapping service to rival Google Streetview

Starting in London, Microsoft has begun taking photographs of the UK for its street-level mapping service, Streetside.
April 13, 2011 13 Apr'11
Retailer Asos sizes up Microsoft Azure to put APIs in the cloud

Online fashion retailer, Asos, is assessing how Microsoft's Azure cloud service could be used to expose mobile data application programming interfaces, which would enable it to extend its reach through mash-ups.
April 12, 2011 12 Apr'11
Banks' IT departments on red alert

A government-commissioned report which has recommended that major banks should separate their retail operations from higher-risk activities will result in banks having to rethink IT strategies.
April 12, 2011 12 Apr'11
HP unveils cloud application migration services

HP has unveiled a suite of services that aim to rationalise applications in businesses. Its Application Transformation portfolio includes services for application modernisation, Windows 7 migration and hybrid cloud deployments. These include private...
April 12, 2011 12 Apr'11
Axed police agency to earn £5m from data sharing application

The National Policing Improvement Agency (NPIA) has agreed a deal for an information sharing application it developed to be licensed to other organisations, potentially earning the police service £5m.
April 12, 2011 12 Apr'11
Mozilla Firefox 5 set for release in June

Mozilla will release the fifth version of its Firefox browser by 21st June 2011, according to a developer roadmap.
April 11, 2011 11 Apr'11
Hornbill harnesses Twitter to improve service desk support

Hornbill Service Management is harnessing Twitter to discover, communicate and resolve IT service delivery problems.
April 11, 2011 11 Apr'11
Securing the cloud is much like securing the enterprise, says industry analyst

Security is widely cited as the single biggest reason for not embracing cloud computing, but security is really made up of several aspects says Quocirca.
April 11, 2011 11 Apr'11
RIM QNX will fail to compete with Apple or Android by 2015, says Gartner

Research in Motion's (RIM) QNX operating system (OS) will struggle to compete with Google's Android OS and Apple's iOS in the tablet market, according to a research firm.
April 11, 2011 11 Apr'11
Flexibility, not cost savings, drives cloud adoption

Despite the cash-strapped business environment, flexibility rather than cost savings is the main reason for organisations adopting the cloud, according to research.
April 11, 2011 11 Apr'11
Denbighshire Council cuts costs with budgeting system

Denbighshire County Council has saved the cost of three full-time members of staff by implementing a budgeting and forecasting system.
April 11, 2011 11 Apr'11
BA deploys Informatica to tackle data integration

British Airways is to standardise on the Informatica data integration platform to deliver timely, trusted and relevant data across the organisation.
April 11, 2011 11 Apr'11
Manageability issues impede adoption of virtualisation

Virtual infrastructure management challenges are hindering the adoption of virtualisation within businesses, according to research.
April 11, 2011 11 Apr'11
Big data boosts Teradata growth

New customers in new markets, growing data volumes at existing customers, and a growing appreciation of how business analytics can hone a company's competitive edge should help data warehousing specialist Teradata meet its ambitious growth targets.
April 08, 2011 08 Apr'11
Counter-terrorism chief discusses the role of technology in reporting extremism

The strategy of encouraging the public to report online terrorist material has been trialled for just over a year and is now being widened
April 08, 2011 08 Apr'11
Admins face huge April Patch Tuesday security update from Microsoft

Microsoft has announced that it will release 17 security bulletins to address 64 vulnerabilities
April 07, 2011 07 Apr'11
Android OS set to overtake Apple by next year

Google's Android will command nearly half of the worldwide smartphone operating system Market by 2012, according to research.
April 07, 2011 07 Apr'11
IT security weak at many UK small businesses, study reveals

Nearly 40% of UK small and medium enterprizes (SMEs) have been hit by malware attack, yet many are still making basic mistakes that put them at risk, a study...
April 07, 2011 07 Apr'11
Server virtualisation can jeopardise storage infrastructures: Ovum

Server virtualisation projects may cause organisations unexpected complications with their storage infrastructures, according to research by analyst group,...
April 06, 2011 06 Apr'11
Case study: US pharmacy firm Medco deploys enterprise app store

Healthcare firm Medco, which provides pharmacy benefits for 65 million Americans, has introduced the concept of an iPhone-like AppStore for its application development.
April 06, 2011 06 Apr'11
Facebook trials real-time ads

Facebook is trialling real-time advertising based on the content of users' status updates and posts.
April 05, 2011 05 Apr'11
University of Nottingham saves £60k a year through VoIP migration

The University of Nottingham is saving up to £60,000 a year after moving to a voice over IP (VoIP) system.
April 05, 2011 05 Apr'11
Banks lukewarm over MPs proposals for transferrable account number

MPs are proposing allowing personal bank account holders to take their account numbers with them in the same way mobile phone owners can keep their number when switching providers, but bank bosses have dismissed the scheme as too costly.
April 05, 2011 05 Apr'11
Analysis: Is the Epsilon data breach a watershed for the marketing industry?

Thousands – potentially millions – of e-mail addresses have been stolen in a hacker attack on US marketing firm Epsilon, but the firm has downplayed the incident, saying that the data is limited to e-mail addresses and/or customer names.
April 05, 2011 05 Apr'11
New Look expands multi-channel strategy with mobile commerce site

Fashion retailer New Look has launched a new mobile commerce website as part of its multi-channel strategy.
April 05, 2011 05 Apr'11
Microsoft lock-in forces European Commission into Windows 7 upgrade talks

The European Commission has been forced into extraordinary negotiations with Microsoft because it is locked in to using the vendor's software and standards.
April 05, 2011 05 Apr'11
Microsoft alerts business to cost benefits of secure software

The software industry can do a lot better to improve the security of applications, says Microsoft.
April 05, 2011 05 Apr'11
Lizamoon hits thousands of websites, but claims few victims

The Lizamoon mass SQL injection attack in which rogue code was injected into thousands of legitimate sites to lure users to malicious sites has claimed few victims.
April 04, 2011 04 Apr'11
The fundamentals of preparing for desktop virtualisation

Virtual desktop infrastructure allows IT departments to break free from the cost of PC renewal cycles and simplify desktop support.
April 04, 2011 04 Apr'11
West Nottinghamshire College halves IT spend through 2X Software's desktop virtualisation

West Nottinghamshire College has halved IT costs and saved 80 man hours a week through desktop virtualisation.
April 04, 2011 04 Apr'11
Web plug-in apps let in criminals too, says HP

Web exploit toolkits have become the favoured weapons of cyber criminals
April 04, 2011 04 Apr'11
Cloud contracts stalled by existing support/maintenance

A survey of 200 IT directors within large enterprise organisations has found that IT directors are worried about the potential management headaches of cloud computing.
April 04, 2011 04 Apr'11
Chivas Brothers use CommVault data deduplication to maximise disc back-up

Chivas Brothers, the Scotch Whisky company, has deployed CommVault to manage data deduplication.
March 31, 2011 31 Mar'11
SMB IT spending seeing significant growth

Small and medium businesses (SMBs) are increasing IT budgets and recruiting more IT skills
March 31, 2011 31 Mar'11
Flaws in NASA network put operations and personnel at risk, report reveals

Computer servers on NASA's agency-wide mission network have high-risk vulnerabilities that can be exploited from the internet, a US government report has revealed.
March 31, 2011 31 Mar'11
RSA breach did not enable a specific attack - Coviello

The security and business world is reeling from the news that attackers managed to breach the information systems of security firm, RSA.