P. J. Connolly

If I’ve learned nothing else from spending a few days with the Windows Developer Preview, it’s that Microsoft is taking few chances on there ever being another Vista. Although the first impression one receives of this taster release of Windows 8 is a dramatically different user experience compared with even today’s Windows 7, in many […]

The latest release of VMware Fusion breaks enough ground that one has to wonder what’s left for future releases. Fusion 4 is a solid virtualization environment that adds support for the latest client and server operating systems, including Apple’s OS X Lion, and release 6 of CentOS and Red Hat Enterprise Linux. I’m even using […]

I’ve spent the last few days kicking the tires on the client version of Windows 8, which set me to thinking about the evolution of user interfaces in general. For years (decades, even) the basic constructs of a desktop, garbage can and nested file folders have dominated the user interface, no matter what operating systems […]

Capacity Is Not the Question The StorCenter PX family includes the px4-300d (left), the px4-600d (right) and the rack-mount px4-300r (below). The four-bay models support up to 12TB of storage, while the six-bay px4-600d can hold up to 18TB. At-a-Glance System Information Although most device provisioning is performed through the Web-based management interface, some basic […]

I confess that years ago I gave up trying to remember my passwords, and since the days of dial-up, I’ve maintained a small notebook that holds configuration details, account information and other scraps of important data. Although I’ve often thought about turning this notebook-and the sticky notes and loose slips of paper that go along […]

Network-attached storage devices have to do more than ever before. It used to be that presenting an Network File System (NFS) target was enough, but today, it’s hard to find a network-attached storage (NAS) unit that doesn’t support a vast array of network and storage protocols, and it’s expected that a NAS device intended for […]

I’m no foodie; I happily prefer chicken-fried steak to Chateaubriand. But I’m excited by Google’s purchase of Zagat, not because it’s going to give me better dining information, but because the deal shows that Google is thinking more about content than algorithms. [WP_IMAGE] This wasn’t Google’s first attempt at establishing a beachhead in restaurant reviews; […]

So, is this year’s missing iPhone just a publicity stunt, as readers and colleagues have suggested? It certainly could be, but I don’t think it is. [WP_IMAGE] First of all, this kind of a PR ploy doesn’t fit Apple’s modus operandi; instead, the company favors all-out silence right up until launch day. That’s why those […]

I spent Labor Day weekend trying to wrap my brain around the case of the latest missing iPhone prototype. This time, however, it’s happening in the part of San Francisco I know and love best. [WP_IMAGE] It seems that back in July, an Apple employee brought what may have been an early version of the […]

I know folks at Apple’s headquarters are kind of preoccupied this week, but in between the obligatory valedictions for the Dear Leader, maybe some of their brighter engineers could sit down and fix a huge problem that’s been hiding below the surface of Mac OS X Lion. [WP_IMAGE] It seems that the company’s implementation of […]

Are Eight Monitors Enough? The HP Z600 workstation can drive up to eight 2D displays, with the help of a single Nvidia Quadro 5000 or dual Quadro 2000 video cards. More Connections Possible (front view) A 400Mbit FireWire (IEEE 1394a) port joins the front panel audio and USB ports on the Z600. Optical drive choices […]

I’ve always been a bit obsessive about documentation, and that mindset comes in handy. For example, I spent a couple of hours this morning reviewing the steps for configuring a Mac to use our corporate VPN and putting them into handout form. This document should already exist somewhere in the files of the IT department, […]