News

Database software

November 29, 2010 29 Nov'10
Massive policy changes in data protection hold keys to business opportunity

This past year, 2010, will be remembered as an important year for data protection, with the highest level of regulatory activity for more than 40 years.
November 29, 2010 29 Nov'10
Lawyers warn of harmful clauses in cloud contracts

Companies should be wary of potentially harmful clauses hidden in contracts for cloud services
November 29, 2010 29 Nov'10
Chinese government hacked Google, claims Wikileaks leaked US diplomatic cables

The Chinese government hacked into Google's computer systems, a leaked US diplomatic report claims.
November 22, 2010 22 Nov'10
SAP user group calls for even greater collaboration with SAP

SAP is doing a better job of listening to and working with users, but more work has to be done in several other areas, says the UK&Ireland SAP User Group.

November 22, 2010 22 Nov'10
Analysis: UK companies fail to plug biggest data leaks – the insider threat

Most companies know they have information that is vital to their survival and that could damage the company if it fell into the wrong hands, but insider data theft is rife in the UK, a survey has revealed.
November 22, 2010 22 Nov'10
Interview: BSkyB’s head of corporate business intelligence on making BI work

Avi Marco, head of corporate business intelligence at BSkyB, speaks to Cliff Saran about BI more agile.
November 16, 2010 16 Nov'10
EMC to buy Isilon for £1.4bn

EMC has announced it will acquire the data storage firm by the end of 2010
November 09, 2010 09 Nov'10
Councils call for local government accounts to be open data

The government is considering a proposal for councils to publish their accounts and other official returns as open data after its transparency initiative...
November 09, 2010 09 Nov'10
Cabinet Office conducts governmental digital review

The Cabinet Office is reviewing the government's digital engagement strategy as part of its business plan to meet the coalition government's policies.
November 03, 2010 03 Nov'10
Has the Windows-based business desktop had its day?

Has the concept of the Windows-based business desktop become irrelevant due to the uptake of low-cost internet-connected devices and mobile apps? Cliff Saran investigates.

November 02, 2010 02 Nov'10
Oracle bolsters e-commerce with ATG acquisition

Oracle has agreed to acquire Art Technology Group, a provider of e-commerce software, for approximately $1bn.

ATG, whose customers include B&Q, Body...
November 02, 2010 02 Nov'10
Oracle copyright court battle with SAP begins

Oracle's court battle with rival SAP over unauthorised access of its customer systems by an SAP subsidiary in 2007 gets into full swing today.

Oracle...
November 01, 2010 01 Nov'10
Oracle starts court battle for $2.3bn in damages from SAP

Oracle's court battle with SAP is set to begin today in Oakland, California as it seeks at least $2.3bn in damages for unauthorised access of its systems by an SAP subsidiary. In a suit filed in 2007, Oracle alleges that SAP's now-defunct support ...
October 28, 2010 28 Oct'10
CA offers same-day mainframe support for DB/2 products

CA Technologies is offering IBM mainframe users same-day support covering 30 CA products.
October 28, 2010 28 Oct'10
Business analytics will enable tailored flight pricing, says American Airlines

Airlines will soon custom-tailor prices and passengers will feel happy to pay it, thanks to business analytics. That's the view of Rick Elieson, managing...
October 28, 2010 28 Oct'10
How Vodafone increased the value of its business intelligence

Chaos and fragmentation greeted Caroline Bellamy when she joined Vodafone UK to breathe new life into the mobile firm's business intelligence operation...
October 27, 2010 27 Oct'10
UK IT directors need product roadmap information

Survey claims the majority of UK IT directors would consider switching suppliers in return for better visibility and influence over product roadmaps.
October 27, 2010 27 Oct'10
Tidal wave of data is heading our way

Brace yourselves, this is going to get rough. The coming tidal wave of data is likely to sweep away old perceptions and practices, leaving many of us floundering...
October 26, 2010 26 Oct'10
Cloud adoption outpacing security controls, survey reveals

While Forrester Research predicts the cloud security market will grow to $1.5bn by 2015, cloud adoption is outpacing security controls, a global survey has revealed.
October 25, 2010 25 Oct'10
New Teradata products ready for 'the socialisation of data'

Data warehousing and business intelligence supplier Teradata has unveiled a slew of products in anticipation of a huge increase in the amount of data that...
October 21, 2010 21 Oct'10
The datacentre designs powering Salesforce.com

Salesforce.com, one of the largest cloud-based software providers in the world, has a unique take on datacentre infrastructure for cloud services.
October 18, 2010 18 Oct'10
London Stock Exchange clients request extra system dress rehearsal

The London Stock Exchange has added a third unplanned dress rehearsal of the launch of its new core trading platform, after its trading firm clients asked...
October 18, 2010 18 Oct'10
London Stock Exchange lets suppliers into its datacentres

The London Stock Exchange has invited suppliers of market data into its datacentre, where it already hosts the systems of trading firms, to increase the...
October 06, 2010 06 Oct'10
BA builds SOA for the long haul

From next month British Airways (BA) will begin rolling out a service-oriented architecture that will eventually enable it to migrate from its 40-year-old mainframe system built on IBM's transaction processing facility (TPF).
September 17, 2010 17 Sep'10
Thomas Cook awards IT deal to Capgemini

Thomas Cook has signed a contract with Capgemini to modernise its IT infrastructure
September 17, 2010 17 Sep'10
Oracle beats forecasts with $7.59bn quarter earnings

Oracle has reported sales of $7.59bn in the three months ending 31 August, up 50% on the same period the year before and above average analyst forecasts of $7.32bn.
September 16, 2010 16 Sep'10
Insurance comparison websites create IT headaches

The increasing use of comparison websites is causing IT performance issues for insurance companies, according to software company Macro 4.
September 02, 2010 02 Sep'10
SAS A2010 conference: Move data out of the back office

Algorithms need to be enhanced to make information more accessible by moving data out of the back office, according to SAS.
September 02, 2010 02 Sep'10
SAS A2010 analytics conference: SAS launches predictive analytics software

Analytic software supplier SAS has launched a predictive analytics service at its 2010 Analytics Conference.
August 16, 2010 16 Aug'10
MoD plans “major data cleansing” for JPA payroll system

The Ministry of Defence (MoD) plans to conduct a "major data cleansing exercise" to improve its payroll software.
August 06, 2010 06 Aug'10
Contactpoint to be disconnected today and deleted in eight weeks

The Contactpoint database of UK children is being turned off today, 10 years after the idea was introduced by the Labour government.

The database was...
August 03, 2010 03 Aug'10
CIOs drive app development to understand customers

Developing business applications is a top priority for CIOs for 2010. Forty six per cent of CIOs surveyed said they were actively developing their CRM applications. In the survey of 200 CIOs by Vodafone, data collection was the second highest ...
August 03, 2010 03 Aug'10
CIA and Google invest in high-tech crystal ball technology

The CIA and Google have joined forces to fund a start-up company that claims to have the technology to predict the future using information collected from the internet.
July 30, 2010 30 Jul'10
Oracle accused of defrauding US federal government

The US Department of Justice has filed a civil suit in a federal court against Oracle, accusing the company of defrauding the federal government by overcharging for software.
July 29, 2010 29 Jul'10
PeerIndex launches as authority ranking platform

The first platform for recognising authority on the web, PeerIndex has launched, attempting to rank web users according to their authority on different subjects rather than the number of contacts they have.
July 27, 2010 27 Jul'10
Betfair seeks IT recruits with global ambitions

Online gambling firm Betfair is looking to hire nearly 100 technology employees and graduates across different areas of expertise. The company is now looking to recruit 80 to 90 people with expertise in areas including C#, C++, SQL Server and Java, ...
July 22, 2010 22 Jul'10
Yorkshire and Clydesdale human error exacerbated by computer

Thousands of customers of the Yorkshire and Clydesdale banks face having to pay more for their mortgages after a "rounding error" was made when a system was upgraded.
July 19, 2010 19 Jul'10
BT hitches onto Arqiva wagon for utility smart meter ride

Signal distribution company Arqiva has attracted BT and security specialist Detica as partners to address communications for the UK's £10bn smart meter roll-out programme.
June 25, 2010 25 Jun'10
Oracle Q4 earnings boost investor confidence

Oracle has announced that revenues for its fourth quarter, ending 31 May, were up 39% to $9.5bn (£6.4bn) and earnings of 46 cents a share, up 24% compared with the same period a year ago.
June 18, 2010 18 Jun'10
Google faces legal action on Wi-Fi interception in US and France

Three US states and France are considering action against Google over the company's interception of private Wi-Fi data by its Street View vehicles as they collected images in 30 countries.
June 14, 2010 14 Jun'10
Westminster replaces Contactpoint with local Children's Hub

Westminster City Council has developed a Children's Hub that replaces a lot of what the cancelled child database Contactpoint would have done.
June 09, 2010 09 Jun'10
Ingres slashes database query time

Open source database supplier Ingres has launched a database project which it claims can cut the time taken to answer business queries by up to 70 times.

The...
May 25, 2010 25 May'10
Saudi Telecom to offer hosted datacentre services

UK CIOs will soon be able to buy hosted datacentre services in Saudi Arabia following Saudi Telecom's decision to enter the hosting business with technology partners Cisco, VMware and EMC
May 21, 2010 21 May'10
Nottingham Building Society boosts efficiency with data analytics

The financial services firm has improved productivity and customer service levels after rolling out a business intelligence suite as part of a £10m IT revamp.
May 21, 2010 21 May'10
Oracle beefs up database security with Secerno acquisition

Oracle has announced it has reached an agreement to acquire database security firm Secerno . "Organisations...
May 13, 2010 13 May'10
SAP to acquire Sybase for $5.8bn

German enterprise software maker SAP has agreed to acquire US database and mobility software producer Sybase for $5.8bn.
May 11, 2010 11 May'10
Pirates cost software firms $51bn, but less than expected

The world's software industry lost $51bn to piracy in 2009 as the unlicensed software rate rose to 43%, but losses were less than expected…
April 27, 2010 27 Apr'10
Interview: David Litchfield enters the realm of database forensics

Database security expert David Litchfield has arguably done more to further our understanding of the security limitations of Oracle and other databases than anyone else.
April 20, 2010 20 Apr'10
Oracle WebLogic loses guest OS

Oracle has unveiled software tools to help IT departments to implement virtualised IT infrastructures.

The Oracle Virtual Assembly Builder is designed...
April 13, 2010 13 Apr'10
Forgotten databases are a bigger risk than firms admit, says Imperva

Forgotten or unprotected databases are responsible for more data breaches than most businesses would like to admit, says security firm Imperva.
April 12, 2010 12 Apr'10
Java inventor James Gosling leaves Oracle

James Gosling, the father of Java, has announced he is leaving Oracle.
March 30, 2010 30 Mar'10
East Coast sales take fast track with data forecasting software

Rail operator East Coast Mainline has increased revenue by 1% after upgrading its revenue management technology to get a more profitable mix of sales.
March 26, 2010 26 Mar'10
Ellison sticks it to SAP as Oracle reports strong sales growth

Despite a fall in net income of 10% to $1.2bn from a year ago, Oracle has reported overall third quarter revenues for its fiscal year ending February up 17% to $6.4bn, driven by software sales.
March 18, 2010 18 Mar'10
Can GPs delay uploading patient data to Summary Care Records indefinitely?

GPs have as much time as they think reasonable to upload patient data to the Summary Care Records database, says guidance which has been issued to London's...
March 17, 2010 17 Mar'10
New rules to govern use of Police National Database

The National Policing Improvement Agency has published a code that governs the use of the Police National...
March 12, 2010 12 Mar'10
Council criticises IT security of Summary Care Records

A local authority has formally raised concerns about the lack of IT security of the Summary Care Records scheme, which is part of the £12.7bn NHS National Programme for IT (NPfIT).
March 11, 2010 11 Mar'10
Tech billionaires’ wealth rises by $55.8bn despite recession

The world's richest technology billionaires upped their collective wealth by $55.8bn last year despite the impact of the recession.

However Bill Gates,...
March 09, 2010 09 Mar'10
DNA database records help solve less than 1% of crimes

Less than 1% of crimes are solved using the DNA records stored on the government's DNA database, a parliamentary select committee said in recommending that DNA profiles of innocent subjects should be kept for a maximum of three years
March 04, 2010 04 Mar'10
Travis Perkins stops data duplication in product database

Construction materials supplier Travis Perkins Group is using the DataFlux data quality platform to de-duplicate its product database.
February 17, 2010 17 Feb'10
Top 25 coding errors – are your software suppliers secure?

International security organisations have updated and restructured a list of 25 common programming errors that cause security vulnerabilities and expose software users to cyber attack.
February 11, 2010 11 Feb'10
Severn Trent Water uses Macro 4 to boost SAP performance

Severn Trent Water has deployed archiving software from Macro 4 to ensure its new SAP system runs smoothly.
February 02, 2010 02 Feb'10
In-memory databases beat administrators on optimisation

IT directors and chief information officers should use new technology rather than skilled database administrators to boost the performance of their data...
January 21, 2010 21 Jan'10
Oracle readies strategy plan as EU approves Sun acquisition

The European Commission has approved Oracle's proposed acquisition of Sun Microsystems, following an investigation into the MySQL database owned by Sun.

The...
January 12, 2010 12 Jan'10
Oracle patches vulnerabilities in 17 enterprise products

Oracle is due to release a suite of critical patch updates which it says fixes 25 security issues in its products.
January 12, 2010 12 Jan'10
Datacentres need to do more with less, but lack skills

Businesses are running more datacentre applications with fewer staff and less budget.
January 05, 2010 05 Jan'10
Lloyds Banking Group extracts value from data

Lloyds Banking Group is using software to help it make better use of complex data to sell to customers more effectively.
January 05, 2010 05 Jan'10
Thousands sign petition to protect MySQL from Oracle

More than 18,000 people have signed an online petition to protect the future development of open source database MySQL, which is owned by Sun Microsystems....
December 18, 2009 18 Dec'09
Oracle boosts software and services revenue with SAP business

Oracle has increased its software licence and product support revenue by 14% to $3.9bn for the second quarter of 2009, at the expense of SAP.
December 16, 2009 16 Dec'09
Paper better than computers for patient records, say UCL researchers

Paper may be a more efficient medium than computers for delivering essential patient information to doctors, researchers have found.

Researchers at...
December 15, 2009 15 Dec'09
Oracle makes concessions to EC over Sun acquisition

Oracle has made a series of concessions designed to end its stand-off...
December 15, 2009 15 Dec'09
Researchers question benefits of computerised health records

US researchers have questioned the savings to be had from computerising healthcare records, raising doubts over the benefits of the NHS's £12.7bn National...
December 11, 2009 11 Dec'09
Oracle accuses EC of manipulating data to block Sun deal

Oracle has accused European competition authorities of cherry-picking comments from a market survey to support objections to the firm's planned acquisition...
December 09, 2009 09 Dec'09
IBM sees no competition issues with Oracle's Sun takeover

Oracle's planned acquisition of Sun Microsystems does not raise any significant antitrust issues, according to Oracle rival IBM.

Despite objections...
November 27, 2009 27 Nov'09
For the sake of Java, allow Oracle to buy Sun, says user group

The UK Oracle User Group (UKOUG) has sent a letter to the European Competition Commission in support of Oracle's $7.4bn deal to acquire Sun Microsystems.
November 27, 2009 27 Nov'09
EU and Oracle to meet soon on Sun deal

Oracle is to meet European Union regulators on 10 December in an attempt to win approval of the planned acquisition of Sun Microsystems, according to reports.
November 25, 2009 25 Nov'09
UK national ID cards database goes live

The database that underpins the UK's controversial ID card scheme is up and running, according to the government's identity commissioner Joseph Pilling.
November 20, 2009 20 Nov'09
EU delays Sun/Oracle decision

The EU has pushed back its deadline for reviewing the Sun merger after granting a request from Oracle for more time
November 16, 2009 16 Nov'09
ISPs criticise government plans to store all comms data

Internet service providers (ISPs) are unhappy with the government's plans to require them to store records of all e‑mail, social networking and web traffic.

The...
November 13, 2009 13 Nov'09
EU ‘optimistic’ of settlement with Oracle over MySQL

The European Union's competition commissioner is "optimistic" about reaching a settlement with Oracle over its proposed $7.4bn acquisition of Sun Microsystems.
November 10, 2009 10 Nov'09
Oracle to oppose EU objections to Sun acquisition

European regulators have issued an official objection to Oracle's $7.4bn acquisition of Sun Microsystems, moving another step closer to blocking the deal.
November 04, 2009 04 Nov'09
Sun and its customers could face more delays to Oracle acquisition

Costly delays to European Commission approval of Oracle's proposed $7.4bn acquisition of Sun Microsystems look set to continue.
November 03, 2009 03 Nov'09
MPs condemn C-Nomis criminal database project

MPs have condemned a major IT project for tracking offenders through the criminal justice system as a £513m shambles.
October 29, 2009 29 Oct'09
Oracle thinks global, but what about UK users?

For most US IT companies bent on expansion overseas, the first port of call is typically the UK where at least the locals speak (almost) the same language as they do in San Francisco. That was the case when Oracle first set up shop in the UK in the ...
October 23, 2009 23 Oct'09
Open source developers oppose Oracle's MySQL acquisition

Prominent open source software developers have joined forces with those opposed to Oracle assuming control of MySQL if Oracle's proposed $7.4bn acquisition of Sun Microsystems goes ahead.
October 21, 2009 21 Oct'09
Council supports learning with banking technology

Oxfordshire County Council is securing and managing online access to educational resources for over 100,000 people with technology originally used by...
October 15, 2009 15 Oct'09
Oracle Fusion Apps could save millions in integration, say analysts

Oracle has showcased a new line of software to be released next year as a key part of the enterprise software company's strategy to win business from rival SAP.
October 15, 2009 15 Oct'09
Oracle OpenWorld: next-generation Fusion and Arnold Schwarzenegger

Oracle OpenWorld closed on Wednesday with CEO Larry Ellison lifting the covers of the firm's next-generation Fusion applications, but finding the show...
October 14, 2009 14 Oct'09
Oracle OpenWorld: Customers can benefit from cloud, says Benioff

Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff took his cloud computing message to Oracle's customers at OpenWorld yesterday, arguing that there was no reason why there...
October 13, 2009 13 Oct'09
Oracle OpenWorld: Oracle wants to 'sell cars, not bits of cars'

Oracle wants to sell you cars, not bits of cars. That was the theme of a remarkably low-key presentation by Oracle presidents Safra Catz and Charles Phillips...
October 13, 2009 13 Oct'09
John Lewis aims for single view of customers

Retailer John Lewis is integrating its in-store and web order systems to create a single view of customers to help it cross-sell products.

The...
October 13, 2009 13 Oct'09
Oracle adds tools for Java, SOA and Web 2.0

Oracle plans to improve its Java development tools, by providing integrated and pluggable tools for Java, service oriented architecture and Web 2.0 application development.
October 06, 2009 06 Oct'09
ID card officials back away from scandal-hit database

Government plans to store ID card biometrics data on a controversial system used by thousands of public workers might be scrapped.
October 01, 2009 01 Oct'09
Start-ups rival SAP and Oracle with cheap software support

The downturn has opened up opportunities for IT departments to cut the support costs of their enterprise resource planning (ERP) software.
September 28, 2009 28 Sep'09
Government covers up Valuation Office security failures

The government has restricted circulation of an auditor's report into information security failures at the Valuation Office Agency (VOA), the body that assesses property values for tax purposes.
September 25, 2009 25 Sep'09
Green cloud from Microsoft's Dublin datacentre

Microsoft has opened its first datacentre in Europe to deliver cloud services to businesses.
September 24, 2009 24 Sep'09
FBI database holds records on 1.5 billion people

More than 1.5 billion government and private sector records about US citizens and foreigners are stored in an FBI database, declassified documents have...
September 21, 2009 21 Sep'09
E-discovery will slash compliance costs, says Gartner

By the end of 2012, organisations that fully document their search processes in e-discovery will save 25% on their collection processes, according to...
September 17, 2009 17 Sep'09
Oracle blames reseller performance for results

Oracle has blamed falling first quarter sales on the recession, currency shifts and weakness in resellers' performance. The database specialist posted...
September 16, 2009 16 Sep'09
Watchdog slams police DNA database guidelines

A human rights watchdog has slammed the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo) for advising chief constables to continue adding DNA profiles of innocent...
September 14, 2009 14 Sep'09
Oracle to unveil Sun-powered database

Oracle will take the wraps off the first product designed with Sun tomorrow, in a move that will indicate just where the merged operation could be heading once the deal gets the go-ahead.