Microsoft is a big proponent of open source, something highlighted by its becoming a Linux Foundation Platinum Member earlier today. The company has been contributing to multiple projects, and back in March, it even announced it was bringing SQL Server to Linux-based operating systems.

Today, the Windows-maker follows through on its promise and delivers SQL Server Preview packaged for two of the most popular business-used Linux-based operating systems -- Ubuntu and Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). While it is not ready for prime-time, both administrators and developers that prefer those aforementioned operating systems can start testing now.

Continue reading →

In an increasingly interconnected world, all organizations are at risk from cyber attacks and manufacturing businesses are no exception.

A new study conducted by Deloitte and the Manufacturers Alliance for Productivity and Innovation (MAPI) reveals that 40 percent of manufacturing companies were affected by cyber incidents in the past 12 months, and 38 percent of those impacted suffered damages in excess of $1 million.

Continue reading →

We tend to think of storage as being a target when it comes to malware attacks with cyber criminals seeking to steal data or encrypt it to demand a ransom. But in fact technology can make storage part of the solution.

Hybrid storage specialist Reduxio believes innovative storage can be used to fight and defeat ransomware and malware. We spoke to Reduxio's Jacob Cherian (VP of product strategy) and Mike Grandinetti (chief marketing and corporate strategy officer) to find out how.

Continue reading →

As we conduct more and more of our work and personal lives using information technology, we have to sign in to lots of different systems. That can mean many different sets of credentials which can be hard to manage.

Federated identity is a way of streamlining this by linking an electronic identity and attributes across several identity management systems. This is related to single sign-on (SSO), which involves sharing authentication between systems -- such as signing onto other websites using your social network ID -- but federated identity goes much deeper.

Continue reading →

The cloud-based office productivity software market is expected to reach $17 billion in 2016. That’s more than a 400 percent increase from 2009 when the market was valued at $3.3 billion.

With the success of cloud-based applications and their pay-as-you-go model, it shouldn’t be surprising that the cloud version of one of the most widely used desktop application packages would grow to become a popular choice for businesses. I’m of course referring to Office 365, Microsoft’s leading productivity and work software package delivered via the cloud.

Continue reading →

Smaller and medium-sized businesses would rather wait a couple years longer before upgrading their systems, compared to large enterprises, a new survey by memory and storage company Crucial shows. Out of 350 IT decision makers in the UK, US, Germany and France, more than half (52 percent) say their company has a hardware refresh cycle of about three to four years.

Large organizations replace systems every two years or so (23 percent) while small organisations wait four years or more (22 percent). The reason behind upgrades is always the same -- their current systems are no longer good enough. Sometimes, businesses would opt to reimage and redeploy problematic storage drives (28 percent), and sometimes, they’d just buy new computers to replace the old and the slow ones (19 percent).

Continue reading →

Modern businesses are increasingly concerned with agility and efficiency and this leads them to seek more mobile solutions. But a new report shows that workforces are struggling with outdated processes that don't adequately support this new world.

The study by performance management specialist Changepoint shows that organizations using time and task data to guide business decisions are relying on old-fashioned methods including Excel spreadsheets (28 percent) and even pen and paper (36 percent).

Continue reading →

Digital certificates are an essential part of online security and as the number of Internet of things devices continues to grow they'll become more important still. But as we rely more on certificates so managing them becomes more complex.

Cyber security solutions company Comodo, the world's leading certificate authority, is launching the latest release of its Comodo Certificate Manager (CCM), a full-lifecycle digital certificate management platform which makes it easier for enterprises to manage their certificates.

Continue reading →

In the dash to the cloud it's easy to lose sight of the fact that it isn't necessarily always the answer to spending your IT budget in the most efficient way.

New data released by cloud management company RightScale reveals that cloud users could reduce their spend by an average of 35 percent by making better use of resources.

Continue reading →

Cloud adoption has hit an all time high in 2016, largely driven by productivity packages like Microsoft Office 365 and Google's G Suite, according to a new report.

Data protection company Bitglass scanned the cloud use of more than 120,000 companies to identify the primary cloud productivity suite used. It finds 59 percent of organizations worldwide now use one of these two apps, up from 48 percent in 2015.

Continue reading →

Network outages are a major source of pain for businesses, so understanding what causes them is an important part of preventing them in the first place.

A new survey from Veriflow reveals that complexity and human error are high on the list as contributing to network problems.

Continue reading →

More and more companies are moving their office applications to the cloud and Microsoft Office 365 is one of the most popular options with around 85 million subscribers.

One of the major concerns with this trend is keeping information secure, to address this IT management solutions provider Kaseya is launching its latest AuthAnvil. An identity and access management solution, this provides single sign on (SSO), multifactor authentication (MFA) and automated user provisioning for Office 365.

Continue reading →

We’re seeing more and more technology functions being virtualized in order to streamline operations and cut costs. Networking is no exception to this trend, though it has been slower to adopt it than some other areas, there are good reasons for this which we’ll look at later. A shift is beginning to occur though.

Network function virtualization allows network tasks to be performed by software running on commodity hardware, replacing expensive, dedicated hardware appliances. This promises easy scaling of functions and should help in the automation of service delivery.

Continue reading →

The importance of mobility in the workplace has grown significantly in recent years, driven by technological innovations like smartphones and web-based applications. The traditional office confines have been eroded and now customers, clients and employees demand the tools required to work whenever and wherever they need to.

Businesses that are unwilling to embrace mobility, or do so ineffectively, risk being overtaken by a competitor that is able to provide the flexibility required by the modern world of work. There are legitimate concerns when it comes to business mobility, but fortunately there are also a number of solutions that allow organizations to adopt innovative technologies without introducing security problems and other issues.

Continue reading →

Businesses are often told that the only way to succeed is by embracing the newest, most innovative technologies. The Internet of things, wearables, 3D printing, augmented reality, the list of disruptive technologies that will make or break your organization is never-ending. However, it is often the less glamorous, but more fundamental technology, that actually determines everyday success.

Business broadband, although hardly cutting-edge, is vital in the "always-on", connected world that we live in. No matter what industry you work in, broadband Internet connectivity is likely to underpin many of your daily tasks. Whether you need to stream video files, access cloud applications or simply look something up online, reliable and fast broadband is an essential part of any modern business.

Continue reading →