Cameron Sturdevant

Oracle Database 11g is loaded with automation features that I praised highly in my review. To gain perspective on the features that will be most beneficial to Oracle shops, I asked veteran consultant Don Burleson to name the top five goodies—and gotchas—in Database 11g. Burleson is a senior consultant at Burleson Consulting, of Raleigh, N.C., […]

Database 11g is the cornerstone of Oracles dynamically allocated computing grids and should garner the attention of database managers with its improved management, recovery and table compression capabilities. Oracle Database 11g, released Aug. 20, also takes much of the guesswork out of advanced database tuning. I tested Database 11g Enterprise Edition for Linux x86 32-bit […]

Jaime Levy Pessin at Dow Jones Newswires reported today that Citigroup’s ABN Amro Mortgage Group allowed a data breach that released the names, Social Security numbers and mortgage information of thousands of people. As Permit/Deny hits the wire, Citigroup public affairs had no comment on the story. According to Pessin’s story, confirmed by Tiversa, the […]

Now is the time for IT managers to ensure that daylight-saving time patches made in the spring are still operative on calendaring systems, desktop and server operating systems, and network infrastructure. Here is a listing of 27 vendor sites with specific DST information and remediation details that IT managers can use to ensure that systems […]

When Network General was reanimated in 2004 I asked “is there life left for Sniffer?” Today, my news colleague Paula Musich reported that NetScout intends to acquire Network General, the once storied leader of packet capture and analysis and creator of the Sniffer product line. From all reports, the entity known as Network General has […]

Hosted applications, including Salesforce.com, make sense if they get enough customers to buy in. The ability to “socialize” — or spread out the costs of a top notch data center including security, availability and scalability among a large group — makes business sense. But now I’m wondering if it would be a better idea to […]

Salesforce.com is still out to prove the point that hosted software applications make sense. One area where this is definitely the case is the area of offline use of the applications. Offline Edition 2.0 enables Salesforce users to manage their CRM data when working without Internet connectivity. It seems the next step is to integrate […]

In a nutshell, Automatic Updates is automatically updating even on Windows XP systems that are set to “no automatic updates.” In mid-September, my colleague Joe Wilcox, editor of Microsoft Watch, reported on suspicions that Microsoft was updating users systems without their consent—even when users had explicitly indicated that they didnt want updates automatically installed. One […]

Defining Emerging Tech In June, Cisco Systems started showing off its latest in emerging technologies. At the time, the focus was on physical security, but three other technologies are coming out of the San Jose, Calif., companys incubator: TelePresence, integrated emergency radio and digital signage. The curious thing is that these are all technology areas […]

Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff on Sept. 17 unveiled Force.com, previewed Visual Force and unveiled Ideas. The packed convention hall was filled with Salesforce.com faithful who were politely enthusiastic when prodded to applaud. Force.com makes Benioff feel like he’s working at a startup again while also striving to break $1 billion dollars a year and move […]