I see 2010 as a time of bearing fruit from seeds planted throughout the
barren year that was 2009.
Certainly, Windows 7 was one of the major technology stories of 2009, but
corporations mostly watched and tested, as is normally the case with new
operating systems and low IT budgets. We'll see larger numbers of
enterprises start deploying Windows 7 in earnest in the second half of 2010 at
the earliest. Along the way, we'll see an increase in interest in migration
tools and services, as well as in image management and storage.
We'll also find that some of Windows 7's ballyhooed enterprise-grade
features—DirectAccess and BranchCache spring to mind—won't make any impact on
corporate networks. Companies won't be ready or willing to make the required
leap to Windows Server 2008 R2 on the back end because the primary feature of
Windows Server 2008 R2—Hyper-V—is vastly inferior to competing virtualization
solutions.
Administrators will also discover that trusty old technologies are better
suited than new ones to helping deal with any application compatibility issues
arising from Windows 7 adoption on the desktop. While XP Mode and Windows
Virtual PC have been touted as the way forward for legacy application support
on Windows 7, corporations won't like the additional management and licensing
burdens involved with supporting two operating systems where there once was
one. Look for a renewed focus on trusty old Terminal Services as the preferred
route for application compatibility, spruced up by Windows 7's enhanced Remote
Desktop client.
2010 will also prove to be a great year for enterprise adoption of 802.11n
Wi-Fi. The standard is complete and ratified, the competitive landscape is
filled with mature products and an access-point price war is cooking. And
with 4-by-4 antenna reference designs coming soon from wireless chip-set
companies such as Quintana and promising up to 600M-bps performance (albeit
geared more toward carrier and HDTV use
cases), prices on the 2-by-3 and 3-by-3 implementations favored for enterprise
usage could drop further by the end of 2010.
Also in the upcoming year, I expect to see more mobile developers adopt Web
development as their primary delivery vector rather than OS- and
platform-specific development. App stores have been an emerging story
during the last 18 months, with Apple's App Store success paving the way for
new mobile-OS-specific marketplaces representing every significant platform.
(And carrier-specific marketplaces are still to come.)
Across the board, mobile developers have expressed dissatisfaction with elements
of the App Store model—dissatisfaction with app approval processes, marketing
outreach potential, financial returns, audience reach and the burden of having
to develop for multiple platforms. Taking a more Web-based approach relieves
many of these concerns, as writing good code for the mobile Web should apply to
all devices rather than a single platform.
For a model of this approach, I applaud DiVitas Networks, which this year
unveiled new Web-based mobile unified communications software. When I tested
its previous solution in late 2008, I found the experience excellent on
Nokia/Symbian but a major kludge on Windows Mobile. But now, with a Web-based
approach, DiVitas has found a way to deliver the majority of the same features
to all mobile platforms that offer a rich Web browsing experience.
Also, come summertime, I anticipate that Apple and the iPhone will lose a
significant amount of their market share in the United
States as the two-year contracts for iPhone
3G buyers start to expire. AT&T's astoundingly poor performance in major
markets will drive customers to other networks and other devices—unless Apple makes
the iPhone available to another carrier, as is widely anticipated to occur sometime
in 2010.
Senior Analyst Andrew Garcia can be reached at agarcia@eweek.com.
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