Be a Con10der: The New Years Top 10 Challenges for the Enterprise IT Professional

Written by eWEEK Labs; Illustrated by Brian Moore

Combine the auditability of e-mail with the freedom of the wiki to create much-needed aids to collaboration.

Introduce single-instance architectures and commonality factoring to reduce disk and network footprints of redundant bits.

Address issues such as 911 service and backup power to bring VOIP fully into the telecom mainstream.

Elevate and clarify the issues of employee purchase and workplace use of insecure or incompatible digital-lifestyle toys.

Monitor the progress and plan the adoption of Wi-Fi laptops and other network infrastructure based on 802.11n technology.

Address the inevitability of enterprise and employee-owned machines running Vista; be proactive on compatibility issues.

Exploit efficiencies of virtual appliances and virtualized operating systems to improve hardware utilization and reduce platform lock-in.

Break down industry segmentation to make Linux a mainstream option for desktops as well as data centers.

Improve communication and cooperation between IT and physical security, power/cooling management and other site functions.

Use secure by default postures of Windows Vista and Mac OS X to rebalance user expectations of security versus convenience.