U-Blog 6

Since most of us are seniors I decided to look at the job market, to see what to expect. As we know the economic crisis is effecting small companies and the largest companies. I came accross an article at computerworld.com discussing one of the biggest IT companies in the industry.

The article discusses Yahoo’s recent financial issues. Yahoo announced that it will lay off at least 10% of its global staff before the end of the year. The layoffs are the major portion of Yahoo’s $400 million dollar expense cutting plan which includes measures for achieving their goal for structural efficiencies. Revenue for the third quarter increased only 1% to $1.768 billion compared with 2007’s 3rd quarter. Net income came in at $54 million down from net income of $151 million in 2007's third quarter. The fourth-quarter staff cuts will be this year's second wave of layoffs for Yahoo, which let go 1,000 employees in February. Yahoo ended the third quarter with 15,200 employees, which means that at least 1,520 of them will lose their jobs between now and the end of the year.

Yahoo also plans to save money by relocating operations to places where it's cheaper to do business, consolidating its real estate, improving procurement and seeking efficiencies in its technology platform. Cost-cutting efforts will continue next year. In addition, Yahoo's plunging stock price and the sagging revenue will start the criticism from doubters who blame Yahoo’s CEO and Yahoo's board for causing the collapse of Microsoft’s attempts to buy the company earlier this year. In May, after a three-month pursuit, Microsoft walked away from the deal after a $33 per share offer was rejected by Yahoo's board, which sought a $37 per share offer. Yahoo's stock closed at $12.07 per share on Tuesday.

Yahoo's results look really bad when compared to its rival Google who reported solid third-quarter results last week. The evolution of the search engine market led to Yahoo's problems. If Yahoo had remained competitive in search, it would be generating significantly more revenue from search advertising. Financial and industry analysts agree that over the past five years, Yahoo has lost its technology edge, which has caused it to miss major growth opportunities in areas like search, online video, blogging, syndicated feeds and social networking. Recent rumors have floated about a possible Yahoo-AOL merger. While that deal would give Yahoo a quick market share and revenue boost, industry experts are suspect about whether it would fix Yahoo's problems.

U-BLOG5

What do you know I found another article at computerworld.com this time. It discussed the infamous Microsoft talking about Microsoft being ranked fifth among Business Intelligence in 2007, but recently Microsoft has been serious about Business Intelligence. Microsoft had done some work to tie Excel closely to the popular database SQL and other back end business Intelligence tools like PerformancePoint Server or SharePoint Server. With its just-announced Project Gemini, that will greatly accelerate. Microsoft aims to "bring an Excel-based user analytics mash up tool into the core of Microsoft's BI and data warehousing product portfolio. Excel isn't the only client application Microsoft plans to leverage. Users will be able to access BI query results from Microsoft's Dynamics 2009 ERP application, according to Tom Casey, Microsoft's general manager for SQL Server business intelligence. Microsoft will also use Internet Explorer to deliver Microsoft's vision of Business Intelligence.

Through integration of technology from its recent acquisition of DATAllegro Inc., Microsoft is building a BI-focused version of SQL Server 2008 called Project Madison. According to research analyst Kobielus, the DATAllegro-powered version of SQL Server 2008, when it is released in the first half of 2010, should be able to scale out to "hundreds of compute/storage nodes" and store as much as one petabyte of data or more. Microsoft also claims that the worsening economy could prove a boon, as companies look for cheaper, easier-to-roll-out products over traditionally high-priced Business Information tools.

WOW! That dog-on Microsoft lol

U-BLOG4

I found an article at www.itworld.com that really caught my attention and I wanted to share it with everyone. It involves telecommunications an industry I am very interested in. This article discusses how the war introduced the first mobile phone networks into Afghanistan. Today, Afghanistan has four privately-owned networks and, mobile phones are the only way most Afghans are able to communicate, especially in remote areas. The importance of mobile technology hasn't gone unnoticed by the Taliban either who destroy towers to eliminate security forces. Communication resources are the core to any security strategy so many have turned to the growing influence and availability of mobile phone networks because it gives the ability to communicate swiftly, broadly, efficiently and effectively.
In January 2007 a major international humanitarian organization began using FrontlineSMS for field communication in their Afghan operations. FrontlineSMS is free software that allows for two-way group text messaging using a laptop computer and an attached mobile phone. This makes it particularly useful in situations where messages need to be communicated quickly and in a coordinated fashion. The Windows version of FrontlineSMS is in daily use in their main operations room, while the newer Mac version is kept as a backup by a senior security officer.
The increasing use of mobile technology by humanitarian organizations reflects a growing recognition of the significance of communications in the wider effort to promote security and democracy in the country. Mobile phones won't solve the security problem alone, but they clearly have a significant role to play.

U-blog 3

I came across an interesting article at www.technologyreview.com I want to share. Intel held a workshop discussing an emerging technology. At the learning workshop intel engineers explain how Intel, the biggest microchip maker, will revolutionize the way future information will be handled. The article explains how Intel has plans to design a more power saving chip that will be the force that drives most future products. The new chip will have features that will allow computers and servers to run faster without an increase for more power. Intel will place a new feature called a power saving control on the actual chip whose only responsibility is to monitor the workload of each the chips individual processor. For example if one core on a dual core processor is active, the power saving control unit will completely shut down the inactive core allowing spare power to allocate to the active core. At the workshop spectators further listened to the development of a way to shut down transistors completely when they are not in use. Transistors tend to still leak electricity even if they are shut down so this feature increases power saving. So ultimately this emerging technology will enable computers to render 3-D animation twice as fast as the swiftest chips today, producing more realistic video games and top-quality animation. Another addition is multi-threading which allows each core to accept twice as much data. Software that is coded to utilize multi-threading can convert a dual-core computer into a four core computer. The name of this new chip is Nehalem. I just found this really interesting and wanted to share the info because information is power and I'm trying to be buff.

U-blog 2

I came across an article at computerworld.com about the issue of there not being enough qualified IT workers available in the market. The author discusses how he believes it is ridiculous that when money is tight for companies, it’s too often that IT's training budget is the first to be cut. He comments on how training has been treated as a benefit, something to be lavished on those who have time rather than a method for a team or the corporate culture. Today with economic and financial troubles the large training budgets are gone, and therefore are the days of training your own employees. I hope by the time I graduate the economy will be stable again and more companies will pay for employee training because I would hate to have to pay for my certifications out of pocket after I just spent 75,000 on my bachelors lol.......but not funny.

U-blog 1

So far this class has already provided me with some new skills and ways to approach adults with training computer skills or some sort of technology. Especially with older people. Some times as a younger person I tend to get frustated when an older person for example, my mother or grandmother, are acting computer illiterate. Like when it comes to something as simple as writing an email. I may think a baby can peform this after one demonstartion but I have discovered that everyone is not a fast learner. But the articles I have read and other course readings have given me new ideas and a state of mind to keep patient and positive when working with adults. I am really enjoying the class and hope to gain much more knowledge and information. Currently I interested in a internship as an IT trainer for a local company and maybe even fulltime. So this class was right on time.

Workplace Learning

After reading some articles, I have learned that every person in America’s workplace has one thing they all need at one point or another and that is retraining. Retraining is significant because of social change and social change affects the workplace. So retooling skills is necessary for longterm success. Business processes and trends change rapidly, therefore workers need to be current with the latest ways to complete business procedures. All American workers can benefit from updating their skills and learning new ones, preparing themselves for tomorrow’s workplace. Retraining gives people in the workforce personal advantage over their competitors and increases a company’s productivity enhancing its competitive advantage in a market. Sources for retraining are federal and state programs, company retraining, Colleges, Universities, apprenticeship, postsecondary vocational schools, labor unions, professional associations, or home study. Because of new technologies, company reorganization, job obsolescence, more money, advancement, a desire for tougher challenges or being straight fired, retraining is a must for every American worker.