Jim Rapoza

Whether you use the term managed services or application service providers—or use the currently trendy term of on demand—hosted solutions provide a quick and simple way for businesses to get up and running with an enterprise application. Ricohs DocumentMall, which was updated in May, is no exception, providing a capable—if somewhat simple—solution for storing, sharing […]

As enterprise applications continue to morph into broader and more complex platforms, it can be difficult to find a solution that focuses on a specific need. Take document management: For many years, document management applications concentrated on—not surprisingly—managing documents. These applications made it possible for companies to handle how documents were stored and moved around, […]

Although Xythos Enterprise Document Management Suite 5.0 emphasizes easy user interfaces and simple and quick deployment, we were impressed with the products broad, capable features. Document Management Suite doesnt measure up to high-end document management solutions such as Documentum or FileNet Corp.s FileNet, but it will provide nearly all the capabilities most companies need for […]

Its the continuing adventures of self-defending Networks! In our previous episode, SDN found itself facing threats on two fronts: in the fictional world of the television show “24,” where SDN successfully thwarted an attack by sophisticated terrorists, and in the real world, where its source code was compromised by a teen hacker. But these threats […]

Among the list of things I cant stand (and, if you read this column regularly, you know thats a pretty long list) are the sleazy, ridiculous and incomprehensible end-user license agreements that software companies hide behind. As Ive written before, these EULAs are basically designed to protect software companies against their own incompetence (such as […]

When Adobe Systems Inc. released the first version of its Creative Suite a year and a half ago, it was really all about the bundle. As far as features in the suite or new capabilities in the component applications were concerned, there wasnt a whole lot there. Click here to read the full review of […]

For a few years now, the main competitors of most products in Adobe Systems Inc.s Adobe Creative Suite have been similar products from Macromedia Inc. But with Adobes acquisition of Macromedia, many of the products on both sides will change, stagnate or be dropped altogether. The acquisition itself wont be finalized until close to the […]

It has been a few weeks since the Supreme Court handed down its landmark Grokster decision, but, since then, I havent seen too many suggestions about what people can do to make sure the decision does not negatively affect innovation or limit fair-use rights. First, heres my quick take on the effects of the Grokster […]

The last few months have been mainly filled with bad news for those who support innovation in technology and fight against bad laws and policies that mainly serve to prevent innovation. The Supreme Courts Grokster decision was a huge blow. (Ill give you my take on that decision and what we should be doing about […]

In my last column, I discussed my often complex positioning—or flip-flopping hypocrisy, as some might say—on some issues, especially those that deal with politics and technology. Before some of you out there in IT land start to get all righteous and smug about how you never flip-flop, you might want to take a look in […]

Ralph Waldo Emerson famously said, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds.” If you read my column regularly—especially when it deals with the intersection of technology and politics—then youve probably decided that I dont have to worry about hobgoblins too much. Or maybe you just think Im a hypocrite. Its a good thing […]

Given recent history, weve come to expect Microsoft service packs to be significant revisions—on the order of a major new release. SP1 for Windows Rights Management, however, is much more typical of a standard service pack, with many of the new capabilities and updates on the back-end and development side, where they will be invisible […]