Daily Tech Digest by Kannan Subbiah

June 10, 2013

Automated Veriﬁcation of Design Patterns: A Case Study
Given the complexity of design veriﬁcation and the frequency by which they need be carried out, practitioners also need tools that automate and report any conﬂicts between design and implementation at the click of a button. However, these needs have so far been di cult to reconcile in practice. Proving and preserving the conformance of a program to its design documentation is largely an unsolved problem.

Google Biometrics Tests Show There's No Magic Pill for Passwords
Regina Dugan, who leads special projects at Google-owned Motorola, disclosed at the All Things Digital conference last week that the company was experimenting with the new forms of biometrics. The technologies are a long way from adoption, but they reflect the boldness with which Google is looking for password alternatives.

Silk platform combines blogging and data visualization
Silk mixes unstructured blogging with structured data, allowing you to visualize and query the structured portion of your information. "Explore" lets you generate a sortable table; bar, line or pie chart; or map (oddly, Silk will attempt to map non-geographic data, such as plotting "iOS" in Greece). Visualizations can be filtered interactively to look at just some columns or only records that meet certain criteria.

Business Analytics Will Be Central for Business Reinvention-Gartner
“We are rapidly heading towards a world of analytics everywhere,” said Dan Sommer Principal Research Analyst at Gartner. “Gartner predicts that analytics will reach 50 per cent of potential users by 2014. By 2020, that figure will be 75 per cent, and we will be in a world where systems of record, systems of differentiation and systems of innovation are enabling IT, business and individuals to analyze data in a much denser fashion than before.

Strategic capacity planning in virtualized data centers
Virtualization is great for streamlining data center operations, but overstuffing servers can easily backfire. The technology is here to stay, so IT teams must look to strategic capacity planning and make the most of their hardware or end up wrangling with inefficiencies in the future. Virtualization expert David Davis talks about maximizing server space, capacity planning tools and the challenges of capacity planning.

DHCS Unveils Enterprise Architecture Plan
The Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) unveiled its enterprise architecture plan, a technology blueprint to make progress on it's nearly $1 billion project portfolio and help implement the Affordable Care Act in California. In a presentation led by DHCS CIO and Deputy Director Chris Cruz, Enterprise Architect Ben Word and Chief Medical Information Officer Dr. Linette Scott, the department laid out it's guiding principles and detailed plans including business, information and technical architectures.

Meta-Decisions: Agreeing on the criteria before discussing the alternatives
In general, the difficulty in reaching an agreement is caused by the fact that different people are forming their opinions using different criteria. Thus, the solution to reduce the time spent in discussions and to make decisions faster is to first agree on the criteria that should be applied when choosing among the several options.

What Managers Can Do To Support Agile Transformation
In a phrase, Agile practices rely on building a collaborative culture. That means the HR department needs to create appropriate teams for the projects at hand, implement fluid systems of engagement versus the more stolid, rigid structures that used to serve organisations well and foster an environment that supports continuous learning at all levels of the enterprise.

3 Lessons From 5 Years Of Federal Data Center Consolidation Delays
Obviously, data center consolidation is more difficult than anyone expected it to be, a reality I've seen firsthand while working on the effort. The problems aren't unique to the public sector. A lack of record keeping and plain old resistance to change are universal human traits. I've learned a few lessons that may help make enterprise data center consolidation efforts more efficient than the feds have thus far been.

Intel unveils Thunderbolt 2
Thunderbolt 2, which had previously only been known by its code name Falcon Ridge, is a reworking of the original Thunderbolt interface to offer 20Gbps of bidirectional transfer rate. ... Thunderbolt made use of four independent 10Gbps channels, two upstream and two downstream, whereas Thunderbolt 2 combines these four channels into two 20Gbps bi-direction channels.

Quote for the day:

"Liberty is the right to do what I like; license, the right to do what you like." -- Bertrand Russell

June 09, 2013

The digital-wallet business is rough — just ask Google
While a decent amount of Android, Blackberry and Windows Phones have NFC enabled in their hardware, only Sprint allows Google Wallet on devices. Having to battle with other carriers, on top of other wallet companies and Apple, with its own forays into Passbook, will further stretch Google Wallet as it struggles to find a steady audience that has access to the product.

SugarSync rolls out remote wipe for PCs and Macs
With the new Remote Wipe feature, both business and individual consumer users can remove all of their synced files. The new tool is also being marketed as a way to make transferring ownership of a computer simpler as all personal or business data stored in the SugarSync cloud can be easily removed and then quickly synced again to a new device.

How to Cultivate a Data Driven Marketing Team
Data: You can’t live with it, and you can’t live without it . At least, that’s how a lot of marketers feel. In fact, the affair between marketers and their data is often somewhat of a love-hate relationship. ... even though data can come with its challenges, successful marketers understand that it’s a necessary evil, and most even learn to love data because it makes them better marketers.

Data breaches caused mostly by negligence and glitches, study finds
Almost two-thirds of data breaches in 2012 could be attributed to negligence or human error (35 percent) and system glitches (29 percent), reported the eighth annual Ponemon Global Cost of a Data Breach study. However, malicious attacks remain the single highest cause of breaches, with 37 percent of the intrusion pie.
Those figures vary by nation, the report showed.

Dell, Oracle form strategic partnership for integrated systems
"We test it together, we patch it together, we support it together," Hurd said. The goal is to free enterprises from integration and maintenance tasks and let IT departments spend more time on internal innovation, Hurd said. "This allows customers to get integrated solutions and support from Dell, with Oracle support backing their entire solution," Hurd said.

Under the covers of the NSA’s big data effort
Yes, the agency has a lot of data and can do some powerful analysis, but, the argument goes, there are strict limits in place around how the agency can use it and who has access. Whether that’s good enough is still an open debate, but here’s what we know about the technology that’s underpinning all that data.

IaaS infringes on acceptance of true PaaS cloud architecture
“PaaS gave us the flexibility to be very nimble as a team, to prototype quickly -- and to throw stuff away if it didn’t work,” said Mario Cruz, Choose Digital’s CTO and cofounder. It meant the company didn’t need to hire dedicated infrastructure and operations staff, and instead could focus on hiring developers. “It’s like having a whole infrastructure team in-house, without actually having an infrastructure team,” Cruz said.

Managing the people side of risk
The cultural differences between companies that acknowledge risk and those that do not are quite stark. ... The best cultures actively seek information about and insight into risk by making it everyone’s responsibility to flag potential issues. ... In the best of cases, respect for rules can be a powerful source of competitive advantage.

Beginner's guide to R: Introduction
Because it's a programmable environment that uses command-line scripting, you can store a series of complex data-analysis steps in R. That lets you re-use your analysis work on similar data more easily than if you were using a point-and-click interface, notes Hadley Wickham, author of several popular R packages and chief scientist with RStudio.

The 90 Minute Guide to Agile – What, Why, How
Allan Kelly, the author of 'Business Patterns for Software Developers' (2012) and 'Changing Software Development: Learning to become Agile' (2008) and also the originator of Retrospective Dialogue Sheets, explains What Agile is, Why companies are adopting it in increasing numbers and How it works, providing suggestions on how to start an Agile initiative and how to do things right.

Quote for the day:

"Those who hate you don't win unless you hate them, and then you destroy yourself." -- Richard M. Nixon

June 08, 2013

ZTE sends 400Gbps over 3,100 miles
While a growing number of operators are upgrading to 100Gbps-links, vendors such as ZTE are preparing for the next step. The company's 400Gbps test was conducted on a WDM (Wavelength-Division Multiplexing) system using single-mode fiber, which is what is currently used for data transmissions over long distances, said Magnus Isaksson, ZTE CTO in the Nordic countries.

Big data analytics: New patterns emerge for security
Intelligence-driven security fueled by big data analytics will disrupt several infosec product segments in the next two years, according to executives at RSA, the security division of EMC. “With the pervasiveness of big data touching everything we do,” said Arthur Coviello, Jr., EMC executive vice president and chairman of the RSA security division, during his RSA keynote in February, “our attack surface is about to be altered and expand, and our risks magnified in ways that we couldn’t have imagined.”

A Futurist's Take on Managing Big Data and Disruptive Technology
Indeed, people have been making the argument that it’s extremely hard to manage technology futures. “But it’s not,” he said. “We’ve been doing it.” IT executives have, in just the last three decades, jumped from the mainframe era, to the PC era, to the client-server era, to the Internet enterprise software era of today. What trips up IT, he said, is focusing on the wrong thing. IT often talks about buying new technology. But, he said, “organizations don’t buy technology. They buy the benefits technology enables.”

Look for Innovation From the Edge
Edges are powerful sources of business innovation because they are places of potential and friction, where traditional products and practices are no longer adequate to address unmet needs or unexploited potential. Much tinkering and experimentation occurs on the edge, as well as heated debate about the most promising options to address emerging needs, intensified by the diverse backgrounds, skill sets, and perspectives of participants gathering on the edge.

Using Power to Empower
Empowering for Ann is: Preparing those who report to her to anticipate and be ready to answer the toughest questions partners or senior executives might ask so thoroughly and accurately that they do not need to go to Ann. Three benefits occur—the recipients’ questions and issues are resolved, they believe that Ann is doing a great job developing her people and Ann has freed up time to concentrate on strategy with peers and partners.

Facebook's first data center DRENCHED by ACTUAL CLOUD
"I got a call, 'Jay, there's a cloud in the data center'," Parikh says. "'What do you mean, outside?'. 'No, inside'." There was panic. "It was raining in the datacenter," he explains. The problem occurred because of the ambitious chiller-less air conditioning system the data center used. Unlike traditional facilities, which use electricity-intensive, direct-expansion cooling units to maintain a low, steady temperature, consumer internet giants such as Google, Facebook, and others have all been on a tear building facilities that use outside air instead.

Facebook's React JavaScript User Interfaces Library Receives Mixed Reviews
Following the recent trend of frameworks like AngularJS, MeteorJS and Model-Driven Views as implemented in Polymer, React is based on the idea of declaratively specifying user interfaces on top of a data model, where user interfaces automatically keep themselves in sync with underlying data. Unlike the aforementioned frameworks, React uses JavaScript rather than HTML to construct those user interfaces, citing flexibility as the reason for this design decision.

Free Google Drive Tools You're Not Using (But Should Be)
But like Google's Chrome browser, Google Drive becomes even more useful when you take advantage of third-party add-ons and services. These five totally free and easy-to-use tools will help you to encrypt your data, play your music, collaborate on slides, back up automatically, share files, and more. Some live on the desktop, some in Chrome, and some online, but all of them work to make Google Drive a happier online home for your data.

A Humble Indian Start-Up Features In Gartner Cool Vendors List
In the list announced for the year 2013, towards the end of April 2013, sharing the spotlight among the rest is a humble Pune based, Indian Start-Up, Qualitia – A Script-less Test Automation Platform. ... Qualitia is an easy yet powerful script less functional test automation platform for all leading test automation tools like QTP, RFT, Selenium and Web Driver.

Using enterprise architecture principles to facilitate SOA governance
While EA methodologies like TOGAF have been adapted to embrace SOA, few enterprises actually map business needs directly to SOA components. This mapping is the most important step in both securing EA benefits and starting SOA governance on the right footing. Enterprises report that the critical issue at this point is a failure to align SOA components with EA-defined processes.

Quote for the day:

"We don't have as many managers as we should, but we would rather have too few than too many." -- Larry Page

June 07, 2013

Cross-cutting concerns may be the next big step for IT
Cross-cuts go beyond standardization. Look at how data centers now use system virtualization, point-in-time storage snapshots and software version control systems. In the last ten years, they've massively overflowed their original banks and come to underpin broad swaths of how apps and services are developed, delivered, deployed and managed. And that's been a very good and helpful thing.

PWC finds IT & Business as Complementary Factors
Notwithstanding the unprecedented changes, the need to navigate through pitfalls and disruptions, businesses are striving to achieve the core objectives of fostering growth, meeting disparate consumer needs, reaching out to markets, compete and succeed. In such times, speeding up the adoption of key technologies like social networks, mobile computing, analytics, cloud computing (SMAC) and other emerging technologies will transform businesses and accelerate wealth creation, especially in the emerging markets economies

Managing and Retaining Data: Top Priority for CPAs
Data is growing at an estimated 50% per year and companies generally have access to that information on a real-time basis through the web and social network traffic, emails, voice mails, videos and data generated by software and sensors used in industrial processes. Advances in computer processing and information technology have made it possible for companies to take a large amount of data, quantify it, analyze it and use it for a variety of purposes.

VMware HA and DRS Capacity Planning
Although DRS and HA are completely independent processes, they can complement each other to create a robust, automated recovery mechanism for the virtualization platform. This paper is intended for VMware and Kingston partners, resellers, and customers who want to implement VI3 in production scenarios and want to proactively plan for physical memory requirements.

US gov defends NSA surveillance, slams 'reprehensible' journalists
Under FISA, Clapper says that Section 702 -- which is designed to gather data on non-U.S. persons residing outside of the United States -- was "recently reauthorized by Congress after extensive hearings and debate." The defence chief says that the order "cannot be used to intentionally target any U.S. citizen, any other U.S. person, or anyone located within the United States."

What Is Insight? Is It Visual?
Analytic logic: did you run through a series of possible matching words until you found the right association? For example, saying: “Does ‘cake’ work? No. Does ‘cone’ work? No. Does ‘tree’ work? No. Does ‘apple’ work? Yes.” Unconscious Insight: did you have a moment of pure insight, where your brain leapt to the right answer? You somehow just knew it, with no conscious thought process?

IT Departments Won't Exist in 5 Years
"Interns coming in for the summer are asked if they're familiar with Google Apps. They say, 'Of course we are,'" said Nathan McBride, vice president of IT & chief cloud architect at AMAG Pharmaceuticals. "Then we have other employees coming in who worked for other companies who say, 'I need Outlook.' We have to say we don't use that anymore."

The age of the 'recycled CEO'
Recycled CEOs don't always work out -- the late Kenneth Lay being a major case in point. He was brought back to revive Enron after a brief stint under Jeffrey Skilling's leadership. That ended badly. A different, but embarrassing, scenario beset Xerox (XRX), when nine-year veteran CEO Paul Allaire was called back by the board in 2000 for a stint.

Providers struggle to turn a profit with current cloud pricing model
Aspiring cloud providers should identify a specific market to sell to before launching a cloud business, Nolle said. "Going out and launching IaaS with no idea of who [the providers] plan on selling to, and no idea what the value proposition will be for the purchase of their [services] is not doing it right," he said.

Creating Resilient Software with Akka
Let’s face it: failure does happen. No matter how hard you try, there is always one more case which you did not foresee and which your testing did not reveal. The question is thus not “how can I avoid failure”, it is “how do I deal with it”. Resilience is defined by Oxford Dictionaries as: the ability of a substance or object to spring back into shape; elasticity; and the capacity to recover quickly from difficulties, toughness

Quote for the day:

"Striving for excellence motivates you; striving for perfection is demoralizing." -- Harriet Braiker

June 06, 2013

Rethink Cloud Security to get Ahead of the Risk Curve
Ever since the cloud sprung up to the top of every IT discussion, the issue of cloud security was right alongside it. Let’s face it, enterprise security has never been easy, and the rapidly expanding use of software in the cloud has added layers of complexity – and risk – to the job. More valuable intellectual property, personally identifiable information, medical records and customer data now sit in the cloud. Risk should not prevent this, but it’s a risk that needs to be managed.

Tactical and strategic health care CIO drives through industry turmoil
Finalist Deanna Wise is CIO and executive vice president at San Francisco-based Dignity Health, the nation's fifth largest health system with 40 acute care hospitals and more than 150 ancillary care sites. A model example of a tactical and strategic CIO, she has led IT and Dignity Health through a period of rapid change by striking an impressive balance between delivering consistent, reliable IT services and breaking new technology ground.

Bank of America CIO on Big Data, Emerging Enterprise Tech
Rather than Big Data, she would prefer to just use the term "data." Despite the overhyping and haziness of the phrase, Big Data is important to $2.2 trillion-asset Bank of America, which has been using data analysis to examine customers' branch visits, calls to the call center, chat sessions, and online banking sessions to get a full view of customer behavior.

Queensland's open data push goes 'global'
Essentially, Queensland Globe is a free application that lets users apply state government data to Google Earth satellite images. Some of the data sets integrated carry information about land tenure status, property and electoral boundaries, and areas affected by floods. But the Premier said the program also included topographical maps and aerial photography that was “a step above” Google Earth.

The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge
In The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge, originally published in the October 1939 issue of Harper’s, American educator Abraham Flexner explores this dangerous tendency to forgo pure curiosity in favor of pragmatism — in science, in education, and in human thought at large — to deliver a poignant critique of the motives encouraged in young minds, contrasting those with the drivers that motivated some of history’s most landmark discoveries.

Cisco Betters its Best-Selling Catalyst Ethernet Switch
Per-port power consumption on the Catalyst 2960-X is 0.9 watts, vs. 2 watts on the 2960-S/SF. Energy efficiency is achieved through support of the IEEE's Energy Efficient Ethernet standard, as well as Cisco's own EnergyWise software. The switches can engage in two modes of "hibernation" during downtime: downlink mode, which powers down less active links; and switch mode, which powers down the switch itself.

Businesses ignore early warning signs of hacking: NAB
There is enough information for organisations to be able to determine whether a form, which could take a user a few seconds to fill out, is actually being submitted in a fraction of a second. Similarly, given that the information submitted in a query should match the form's elements, including their order, any variance to these could give organisations an early warning that someone is planning an attack or performing reconnaissance on their systems.

Microsoft, FBI crack cybercrime ring
"The harm done by Citadel shows the threat that botnets, malicious software, and piracy pose to individuals and businesses around the world," said Brad Smith, Microsoft general counsel and executive vice president, Legal and Corporate Affairs. "Today's coordinated action between the private sector and law enforcement demonstrates the power of combined legal and technical expertise and we're going to continue to work together to help put these cybercriminals out of business."

100 Columns and Counting: Gary Cokins on His Life in Analytics
"My observation is that although it is ideal to have executive sponsorship for new projects and methods, often executives are distracted with fire-fighting and short-term priorities. I enjoy empowering champions who want to improve their organizations. I have seen the successful outcome of EPM systems I have helped implement with substantial tangible results. I get pleasure knowing I made an impact. "

IPv6 in action: How Mythic Beasts does it
RFC1883, the document that describes IPv6, was written in 1995. It was the next big thing on the Internet. Google records how many IPv6 requests come in and last year the total reached the dizzying heights of 1%! After most of two decades, one in a hundred Google requests are not IPv4. You couldn’t really say IPv6 is taking off like a rocket. That’s all going to change in the next few years. Cisco reckon IPv6 takeup will hit 23.9% in 2017.

Quote for the day:

"Everything's in the mind. That's where it all starts. Knowing what you want is the first step toward getting it." -- Mae West