IT Executive news

• UCLA just open-sourced a powerful new image-detection algorithm

  10-02-2016 23:22
  
  Image recognition has become increasingly critical in applications ranging from smartphones to driverless cars, and on Wednesday UCLA opened up to the public a new algorithm that promises big gains.The Phase Stretch Transform algorithm is a physics-inspired computational approach to processing images and information that can help computers "see" features of objects that aren't visible using standard imaging techniques. It could be used to detect an LED lamp's internal structure, for example -- s
  
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• How Symantec's CIO used SDN, cloud to pull off Veritas split

  10-02-2016 22:29
  
  It's not uncommon for CIOs of large enterprises to manage big changes associated with mergers and acquisitions. But what is a CIO to do when she’s tasked with building new infrastructure for a standalone company in 12 months? That's the question Symantec CIO Sheila Jordan faced after the board decided to divest Veritas, the storage software maker it purchased in 2005, to focus squarely on its core security business.Symantec CIO Sheila Jordan.Jordan knew she had to reduce the risk associate
  
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• Microsoft lets cautious users try more of Windows 10’s leading edge

  10-02-2016 21:48
  Microsoft's Windows 10 betas have officially become a three-ring circus.The company announced Wednesday that in addition to the Windows Insider Program's traditional Fast and Slow distribution rings that let the public test upcoming versions of Windows 10, there will also be a Release Preview ring that lets users get an early glimpse of what's coming to their PC while retaining stability. People who opt in to the Release Preview ring will remain on the current version of Windows 10 until Mi
  
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• Bill filed in Congress would ban encryption backdoors

  10-02-2016 21:37
  
  Four Congressmen are proposing that states be forbidden to ask manufacturers to install encryption backdoors on their products outfitted with the technology.
  U.S. Rep. Ted Lieu
  The four filed a short bill this week that would deny states or parts of states from seeking alterations to products for the purpose of enabling surveillance of the user. It would also block them from seeking the ability to decrypt information that is otherwise unintelligible. The representatives filing the bill are Rep.
  
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• Windows 10 Insider option makes desktop and mobile testing less scary

  10-02-2016 21:03
  Many PC users have an extra system or two kicking around, which can be used to test new preview builds of Windows 10. But most users have only one active phone, making the prospect of testing a preview mobile OS less likely. Enter Microsoft's new "Release Preview" track: a preview build that scales back risk and is available for mobile hardware.
  Microsoft debuted the new Release Preview track as part of Windows 10 Mobile Preview Build 10586.107, an otherwise uneventful preview release that fixe
  
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• Networking company name change madness is upon us

  10-02-2016 20:41
  
  Tech companies LightSquared, Crittercism and ThinkingPhones are still around but no longer answer to those names.
  You practically need a scorecard to keep track of these companies this week, as they have all changed names for one reason or another, and naturally are putting a positive spin on the results.
  The networking industry has a long history of name changes, from France Telecom to Orange, Siemens Enterprise to Unify, and more recently, Google to Alphabet, etc. But of course redoing a comp
  
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• Don't touch the malware at this museum

  10-02-2016 20:14
  
  Malware moments you wish to forgetImage by Jelene Morris (modified)Jason Scott, archivist and software curator for the Internet Archive, and Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer of F-Secure, have brought together this group of malware to mark some of the early viruses. Here are only a few, with another batch to be displayed soon.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: How CIOs can proactively identify and solve business issues

  10-02-2016 20:08
  
  Traditionally the role of the CIO has been to keep the data center humming, but increasingly CIOs are becoming active members of the C-suite and involved in business decisions. In a previous article, I describe how Abe Leitz, CIO at Curves Jenny Craig, transitioned IT from an order taking role into a consultative role. For this article, I interviewed Ryan Fay, Global CIO at ACI Specialty Benefits, to learn how he uncovers and solves business problems before the business units even know they have
  
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• Browser maker Opera's board urges sale to Chinese collective for $1.2B

  10-02-2016 20:08
  
  Opera Software's board today recommended that shareholders approve the $1.2 million offer by a group of Chinese companies for the company, the result of a sales exploration since August.
  The Norwegian company is best known to consumers as the maker of the Opera browser for personal computers, mobile phones and smartphones. Those parts of Opera Software, however, are minor contributors to the firm's bottom line, which is dependent on its mobile advertising platform.
  "The Consortium's ownership w
  
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• A new IoT gateway design could be Bluetooth's ticket to the cloud

  10-02-2016 20:03
  
  The Bluetooth Special Interest Group wants to raise Bluetooth's profile in the Internet of Things with a toolkit for building gateways between the short-range wireless network and the Internet.The toolkit should make it easier to build gateways that collect data wirelessly from Bluetooth devices and then transfer it to the cloud via Ethernet, mobile broadband or other networks.A basic use of gateways could be medical devices automatically sending and receiving health information from doctors far
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: How to create and lead self-managing teams

  10-02-2016 19:55
  
  Earlier blogs describe the foundational steps that enable agile data warehouse development. The next focus for setting yourself up for a best in class agile data warehouse environment is to develop and support self-managing teams.Why are self-managing teams so important?
  The word agile conveys a number of meanings. Its simple definition as an adjective is “quick and well-coordinated."  From a project methodology perspective, agile is focused on consistently delivering high value
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Why experts are slowing the emergence of digital health

  10-02-2016 19:48
  
  Digital health is the convergence of the Digital and Genomic Revolutions specifically health, healthcare, living and society. Personal empowerment is the heartbeat of digital health making our lives better by managing, tracking and improving wellness for a healthier tomorrow. The realization of this healthier and seamlessly connected future will require orchestration between the physical and digital world. This orchestration will be conducted by digital experts.What does it take to be an industr
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Linux goes to Washington: How the White House/Linux Foundation collaboration will work

  10-02-2016 19:40
  
  No doubt by now you've heard about the Obama Administration's newly announced Cybersecurity National Action Plan (CNAP). You can read more about it on CIO.com here and here.
  But what you may not know is that the White House is actively working with the Linux and open source community for CNAP. In a blog post Jim Zemlin, the executive director of the Linux Foundation said, “In the proposal, the White House announced collaboration with The Linux Foundation’s Core Infrastructure Initia
  
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• LG's G5 smartphone to have 'always on' ability

  10-02-2016 19:14
  
  LG's next flagship Android smartphone, the G5, will come with an "always on" display, according to a teaser posted today on the LG Facebook page.
  The full reveal of the G5 is expected on Feb. 21, just prior to the start of Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
  LG hasn't given many other hints about the G5, although it tagged an animation on the Facebook page with the line, "Never go asleep while others do."
  The G5 is also rumored to have a removable battery that is pulled out from the bottom of t
  
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• Healthcare CIO: Legal issues are most difficult cloud migration challenge

  10-02-2016 19:08
  
  Boston healthcare organization CIO and longtime technology standards leader John Halamka has been quite open over the years about his organization's technology efforts and challenges. Back in 2002 he shared his hospital's 3-day struggle with network slowdowns. Last Year,  the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center CIO sounded the alarm that an FDA warning about a compromised medical device wouldn't be the last.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here
  
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• Data science achieves the ultimate ROI: a craft beer

  10-02-2016 18:29
  
  If there was still any doubt about the value of data analytics, this should lay it to rest in a single word: beer.That's right, digital marketing agency Havas Helia has created 0101, a beer that was crafted based on data.Late last year, Havas Helia's goal was to create a beer that embodied the optimism associated with beginning a new year. It began by tapping social media for emotional keywords used in New Year's-related posts and then scored "thousands of messages" against a set of 24 predefine
  
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• U.S. Windows 10 Mobile phones: Vaio says no, Alcatel OneTouch says yes

  10-02-2016 18:11
  
  U.S. smartphone buyers are getting another Windows 10 Mobile phone to chose from, one that’s much cheaper than Microsoft’s high-end Lumia handsets.
  The Alcatel OneTouch Fierce XL with Windows 10 is now available through T-Mobile for $140 without a contract. Buyers can also get the phone for no money down and $5.84 per month. For that price, you get a 5.5-inch 720p display, 1.1GHz quad-core processor, 8MP rear camera, 2MP front camera, 2GB of RAM, 16GB of storage, and a microSD card
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Day One 2: Journal app users unhappy with pricing and sync options

  10-02-2016 17:42
  Day One 2 is the new version of the most popular iOS and OS X journaling app. It's been out for a little while now and Day One users have had a chance to discover its new features as well as the lack of iCloud and DropBox syncing, and some of them are not happy with Day One 2.Day One users pulled no punches while expressing their feelings about Day One 2 in a thread in the Apple subreddit:
  Johnnydangr: ”It eliminated iCloud sync so you will need to use their service for syncing.”Bert
  
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• Ford uses 'industry first' wearable for QA at assembly plant

  10-02-2016 17:39
  
  Today, American automobile maker Ford issued a press release to announce an "industry first" wearable device that works in conjunction with an Android smartphone app to help assembly plant workers in Spain perform "faster and more accurate" quality assurance (QA) checks on vehicles as they're assembled.From today's press release:
  "Previously, workers at Ford’s manufacturing facility in Valencia, Spain, used a paper-based system that involved walking back and forth more than one kilometer d
  
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• SAP slaps patch on leaky factory software

  10-02-2016 17:06
  
  SAP's February round of critical software updates includes one for SAP Manufacturing Integration and Intelligence (xMII) that may be of interest to hackers and spies.
  The software is widely used in manufacturing industry, where it connects factory-floor systems to business applications for performance monitoring -- but a flaw in it meant that restrictions on who could see what were not enforced.
  The patch for xMII fixes a directory traversal vulnerability, SAP reported Tuesday in security note
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Why less is more with project management

  10-02-2016 16:43
  
  “If you want to make sure that something is not done...make it a project,” I have had several senior executives, including CIOs, in different large corporations, tell me this when I start exploring why their companies have so many projects, and why they often fail in delivering them or achieve any tangible benefits.
  In this blog I will share my experiences when dealing with the very complex, and often undervalued, world of “project management.” As a lead practitioner, as
  
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• Twitter begins rolling out its algorithmic timeline, but it's opt-in—for now

  10-02-2016 16:37
  After months of testing, rumors, and general user anxiety, Twitter is now employing an algorithm that displays some Tweets out of chronological order.
  The feature, known as “Show me the best Tweets first,” gathers up older tweets that Twitter thinks you might have liked seeing, based on “engagement and other factors,” and pushes them to the top of the Timeline. Below this cluster of Tweets, users will still see their Timelines in reverse chronological order, and refreshi
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: LibreOffice 5.1 shows first signs of a new user interface

  10-02-2016 16:25
  
  The Document Foundation today announced the release of LibreOffice (LO) 5.1.  With this release, LO is moving toward a totally reorganized user interface.
  In earlier conversations with LibreOffice developers and The Document Foundation whenever I would ask about modernizing the UI they told me that their first priority was to clean up the code they inherited from OpenOffice. And once the codebase is clean they would start to focus in UI.
  That day has finally come.
  Jan Holesowsky, a Directo
  
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• Kleine minderheid IT beslissers tevreden met huidige architectuur

  10-02-2016 16:03
  Terwijl goed geïmplementeerde en efficiënt gebruikte informatietechnologie de concurrentie op afstand kan zetten, blijken organisaties in de Benelux IT maar al te vaak te beschouwen als een blok aan het been. Slechts 13% van de IT-professionals vindt dat hun architectuur voldoet. Daarop duidt een... lees meer
  
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• Paul McCartney gives Skype some silly love songs

  10-02-2016 16:00
  
  Sir Paul McCartney is an international superstar, known for his music the world over, which naturally makes him a logical choice to create the soundtrack for an animated, amorous octopus, who comes bearing fuzzy handcuffs. Skype teamed up with the legendary British musician on a set of 10 animated cartoon “Mojis” that are designed to help its users express love in their instant message conversations. After all nothing says love quite like a banana seductively peeling itself to s
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Demonstrating leadership in IT is an all-around contest

  10-02-2016 15:23
  
  When queried, most companies’ executives rank leadership skills as high or higher than technical skills when looking for a new CIO. Technology will get you the interview, but the demonstrated ability to lead during change and transformation will get you the job.
  So what is leadership for a technology leader? I often use the analogy of comparing IT leadership to a Decathlon (thus the title of this blog!). Traditionally, the title of "World's Greatest Athlete" has been given to the individua
  
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• FCC wants ISPs to let you use any set-top cable box

  10-02-2016 14:57
  
  If you're of a certain age (as I am) you might remember when you couldn't buy a telephone — you had to rent one from AT&T. People objected to that monopolistic practice, but the phone company claimed "foreign" devices would endanger its network and wreck its business.
  Of course, that was all nonsense, and when the U.S. courts eventually ended the practice the once stodgy telecommunications market blossomed to the great benefit of consumers, and ultimately to the industry.FCC chai
  
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• Microsoft fixes 36 flaws in IE, Edge, Office, Windows, .NET Framework

  10-02-2016 14:52
  
  Microsoft released its second batch of security updates for this year, addressing a total of 36 flaws in Internet Explorer, Edge, Office, Windows and .NET Framework.
  The patches are covered in 12 security bulletins, five of which are rated critical. There is also a thirteenth bulletin, also critical, for Flash Player. Although it's maintained by Adobe, Flash Player is included with Internet Explorer 11 and Edge, so Microsoft is distributing Adobe's patches through Windows Update.
  Researchers fr
  
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• How CIOs can survive and thrive at hypergrowth businesses

  10-02-2016 14:37
  
  The audit, tax and consulting firm of RSM US LLP has had three consecutive years of double-digit growth, so when CIO Troy Cardinal develops his strategic vision, he says he must have a plan for keeping up with the company’s unprecedented rapid growth.To date, that has meant growing his IT group from 170 in mid-2014 to 220 people today and devising a project portfolio that increased about 50 percent year-over-year in the past few years.[ Related: The State of the CIO 2016 by the numbers ]Wi
  
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• Facebook has just 60 days to change its terms and conditions for French users

  10-02-2016 14:17
  
  Facebook has just 60 days to change its terms and conditions for French users, or face legal sanctions.France's Directorate-General for Competition, Consumers and Fraud Prevention (DGCCRF) has audited the social network's terms of use and concluded that they contain unfair contract terms illegal under French law.With its 60-day deadline, the DGCCRF jumps to the head of the line for Facebook's lawyers' attention: On Monday night the French National Commission on Computing and Liberty (CNIL) gave
  
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• Coming to HP's consumer laptops: Smoother video with AMD's FreeSync

  10-02-2016 14:00
  
  Expect smoother video when HP puts AMD's FreeSync technology in more consumer laptops later this year.FreeSync helps laptop displays show visuals the second they are drawn up on a computer, which is key for smooth rendition of games and high-definition video. With FreeSync, GPUs communicate directly with displays, which reduces image stutter and lag time.HP will first bring FreeSync to its HP Envy 15z, which will be refreshed in the first half this year with the new AMD 6th Generation A-series c
  
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• 10 things that keep CMOs up at night

  10-02-2016 14:00
  
  The chief marketing officer (CMO) role has become ever-more important in modern organizations and enterprises around the world, propelled by the rise of digital marketing, big data, and the need to engage customers across multiple platforms, on a more personal, interactive levels.But hey, no pressure. We asked CMOs at established enterprises and burgeoning startups about what concerns them most about the job role and the market, as well as any advice they have for how colleagues can keep up
  
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• Obama’s cybersecurity agenda bold, but relies on untested funding, experts say

  10-02-2016 13:58
  
  President Obama is floating a $3.1 billion plan to upgrade drastically outdated federal cyber infrastructure, but it depends on uncertain initial outlay from Congress and an untried funding mechanism, experts say.
  The IT Modernization Fund would require one-time funding and then be replenished down the road by agencies that have tapped it to pay for moving from old systems like mainframes to more modern, reliable and defensible machines.
  Ari Schwartz
  “It’s not similar to anything th
  
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• How high will IT salaries climb?

  10-02-2016 13:55
  
  Average technology salaries in the U.S. saw the biggest year-over-year leap ever, jumping 7.7 percent to $96,370 annually, according to the annual 2015-2016 salary survey by careers site Dice.com. Bonuses and contract rates also rose in 2015, and tech salaries in seven metro areas reached six-figures for the first time since the survey began more than a decade ago. The question is, how high can they go?The wage hikes paint a picture of an overall solid environment for technology professionals wi
  
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• IDG Contributor Network: Who will unlock the giant data bottleneck in healthcare?

  10-02-2016 13:41
  
  A recent article in the Harvard Business Review discusses the findings of a survey of senior executives across sectors and confirms that two-thirds of them report having big data in production, with 70 percent indicating that big data is of critical importance to their firms. Consumer oriented industries such as financial services are heavily represented in the survey, as are life sciences firms.As with most innovation and new technology programs, adoption rates and effectiveness will vary acros
  
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• IBM's X-Force team hacks into smart building

  10-02-2016 13:37
  
  As buildings get smarter and increasingly connected to the Internet, they become a potential vector for attackers to target.
  IBM's X-Force ethical hacking team recently ran a penetration test against a group of office buildings using building automation systems that controlled sensors and thermostats.
  In this particular case, a building management company operated more than 20 buildings across the United States, as well as a central server.
  Without any social engineering, or online data gatheri
  
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• 7 things CIOs should know about SharePoint Server 2016

  10-02-2016 13:30
  
  A release candidate of SharePoint Server 2016 has arrived as a New Year’s present for us all. And with the release to manufacturing (RTM) of the latest version of Microsoft’s flagship collaboration product expected sometime this year, it appears to be a good opportunity to step back and survey seven things every CIO should know about SharePoint Server 2016.1. SharePoint Server 2016 might be the last version of SharePoint designed to run on premisesYou can even tell in the messaging
  
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• IT automation in the wild

  10-02-2016 13:23
  
  If Catherine Maras would have one rallying cry for her information technology group, it would no doubt be “Remember Bexar County!” That would make perfect sense, as Bexar County, Texas, has as its county seat the city of San Antonio, home of The Alamo. But Maras doesn’t want the region to be just known for its prominent place in history. She wants her staff to think of it as a true center of innovation in digital government, and aiding in the process is the county’s
  
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• 8 body language mistakes candidates make in job interviews

  10-02-2016 13:23
  
  Body language mistakes candidates make in job interviewsImage by ThinkstockBody language is just as important as your skills, and it's crucial to make a good impression on your recruiter or hiring manager in the interview. Recently, Careerbuilder conducted a survey of over 2,100 hiring and human resource managers to find the most unbelievable interview stories and to discover what body language mistakes candidates make in the interview process.According to the study, some candidates make a first
  
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• Microsoft delivers Office 2016 to subscribers on the slow train

  10-02-2016 13:08
  
  Microsoft yesterday issued Office 2016 to Office 365 commercial subscribers who had adopted the slower release cadence, which the company called "Current Branch for Business."
  Those customers may begin downloading and installing the same Office 2016 client applications -- Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Word and others -- that debuted in September 2015.
  Also on Tuesday, Microsoft renamed the Office 365 release tracks it first spelled out in September. "Current Branch for Business" has been relabele
  
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• Rumor check: Everything we think we know about the Samsung Galaxy S7

  10-02-2016 13:00
  
  If you’re an Android fan, then you might be aware of some of the rumors making the rounds on the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S7. I personally don’t like commenting on rumors, but Mobile World Congress is just around the corner and the rumblings regarding Samsung’s next flagship device can no longer be ignored.
  Here’s a look at some of the latest hearsay on the Samsung Galaxy S7, which will be officially revealed on February 21.It could ship with a 12-megapixel camera
  Florenc
  
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• Identity thieves obtain 100,000 electronic filing PINs from IRS system

  10-02-2016 12:20
  
  The Internal Revenue Service was the target of an attack that used stolen social security numbers and other taxpayer data to obtain PINs that can be used to file tax returns electronically.The attack occurred in January and targeted an IRS Web application that taxpayers use to obtain their so-called Electronic Filing (E-file) PINs. The app requires taxpayer information such as name, Social Security number, date of birth and full address.Attackers attempted to obtain E-file PINs corresponding to
  
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• Windows 10, revealed: You'll get more information from Microsoft in future updates

  10-02-2016 12:00
  
  For months, Microsoft has been somewhat secretive about what’s inside the cumulative “rollup” updates that it’s provided to release versions of Windows 10—even as it’s provided Windows Insiders beta testers fairly extensive detail about what effects those updates would have on their PCs.
  With the 10586.104 update Microsoft released Tuesday, the two sides are on more equal ground. Microsoft now provides a “changelog” of what each Win
  
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• Review: Azure brings IoT to .Net developers

  10-02-2016 12:00
  
  Technology trends don’t come more nebulous than the “Internet of things.” After all, a thing can be anything. For developers wanting to get past fuzzy concept to real code, Microsoft’s Azure cloud is a fine place to start. Like Amazon’s AWS IoT, the Azure IoT Suite pairs back-end services with SDKs for low-power client devices such as the Raspberry Pi. Unlike AWS IoT, Azure supports .Net development as part of the mix.To read this article in full or to leave a comm
  
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• Artificial intelligence in the enterprise: It’s on

  10-02-2016 12:00
  
  After a long winter frozen in the technological permafrost, it's springtime again in the field of artificial intelligence.To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here(Insider Story)
  
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• 7 elements of cloud SLAs you should focus on

  10-02-2016 12:00
  
  Service-level agreements for cloud services are, at their core, more challenging than other SLAs because many cloud providers are unwilling to modify or adjust them. They want a relationship of “one to many,” with the same SLAs applicable to all of their customers.
  That works out well for the cloud providers, but not for their customers.
  Worse, many cloud providers’ SLAs are “cupcakes,” extremely weak and nearly worthless. In some cases, it can take a catastrophic
  
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• Retired IT specialist shares inside story of botched National Park Moose project

  10-02-2016 11:59
  
  You might think that a niche conference on cabling design and installation held in Orlando in February would be a sleepy little affair, but I found just the opposite to be true.The table setter when I arrived was a humorous/informative look by Ekahau's Jussi Kiviniemi at designing Wi-Fi networks for high capacity. The presenter compared such network installation and design to that of setting up a bar, but also made pointed observations about the conference center’s own imperfect Wi-Fi inst
  
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• Opera gets acquisition offer from Chinese consortium that includes Qihoo

  10-02-2016 08:13
  
  Browser company Opera Software has received an acquisition offer for about US$1.2 billion from a Chinese consortium consisting of Internet companies Beijing Kunlun Tech  and Qihoo 360 Software.Opera hopes that its products will get a boost from the user base in China of Qihoo and Kunlun, which in turn hope to cross-sell their products and services to the Opera user base, and take advantage of Opera's mobile advertising platform.Kunlun, which acquired in January a majority stake in dating si
  
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• US regulator coming around to view that a Google computer could qualify as car driver

  10-02-2016 06:12
  The U.S. federal transport safety regulator is coming around to the view that rules could be updated so that computers in autonomous cars can be considered as drivers, but added that the rule-making could take some time.The move by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration could be a major boost for Google and a number of companies including traditional car makers that are working on partially or fully autonomous vehicles."If no human occupant of the vehicle can actually drive the vehic
  
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• Is Docker ditching Ubuntu Linux? Confusion reigns

  10-02-2016 02:54
  
  Docker has long relied on Ubuntu Linux as the default host environment for Docker apps, but comments from the company's CTO recently suggest that might not be the case much longer."We have hired Natanael Copa, the awesome creator of Alpine Linux, and are in the process of switching the Docker official image library from Ubuntu to Alpine," a user named shykes wrote in a Hacker News thread 10 days ago. Docker confirmed Tuesday that shykes is Solomon Hykes, Docker's founder and CTO.
  
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