3rd May 2006 Archive

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Microsoft and SAP do a Duet on Office

Integration dance

Microsoft and SAP have laid out a roadmap for Mendocino, renamed Duet, and promised greater integration between their Office and business applications to automate business activities. Duet 1.0, scheduled to launch on 28 June just over a year after Mendocino was unveiled, will debut with four so-called scenarios for use by …

Applications 3 May 2006, 08:32
Buggy spreadsheets: Russian roulette for the corporation

The chasm between common sense and computer programming

How many scenarios can you imagine where a momentary loss of concentration could cost over $1bn? Perhaps a nuclear power station meltdown...or if a currency trader hit a few wrong keys? Well, another possibility is a simple spreadsheet error. In October 2003, soon after announcing third quarter earnings, Fannie Mae had to …

Developer 3 May 2006, 08:37
Gartner: More Windows Vista delays

Falling out

Microsoft and Gartner are squabbling again, this time after the analyst predicted yet another delay to Microsoft's already late-running Windows Vista operating system. According to Gartner, Windows Vista is unlikely to ship before the second quarter of 2007, pegging it for launch in April next year, with "broad availability" …

Operating Systems 3 May 2006, 08:41
Conservatives investigate government IT

Respond to recent 'fiascos'

David Cameron, leader of the Conservatives, is setting up a working group to investigate the Labour government's use of IT and management practices. The Conservatives said the group, announced on 1 May, is a direct response to recent "fiascos" surrounding the Labour government's handling of IT and management information. A …

Public Sector 3 May 2006, 08:46
Sony shows summer Vaio laptops

Speed, storage bump

Sony has announced its summer Vaio notebook line-up, boosting family members' memory, processor and storage specs. Take the FJ3 series, for example. This slimline 14.1in range now incorporates dual-layer DVD+RW support in addition to the many other recordable and rewriteable CD and DVD formats already handled. The range …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 08:52
Kids texting not sleeping

2 tired to cnt shp

Kids are going to school too tired to learn because of the temptations of late night texting and playing computer games. Telecoms provider ACE-COMM says UK telcos could do more to help parents. Jock Percy, senior analyst at the firm, said: "Confiscating a child's phone seems an unreasonable invasion of privacy to most parents, …

Mobile 3 May 2006, 08:54
EDS results on track

Services giant on course...

EDS posted improved profits for the first quarter ended 31 March 2006, but just missed Wall Street predictions. The services giant made $24m profit in the three months, compared to $4m in the first quarter of 2005. Analysts were expecting closer to $30m. EDS brought in revenues of $5.08bn, up 10 per cent on the same quarter …

Channel Register 3 May 2006, 08:56
£20,000 reward for software whistleblowers

Stakes raised in BSA licensing offensive

The Business Software Alliance has doubled its maximum reward for people who report the use of unlicensed software within UK businesses before the end of June. Staff can report their bosses, remain anonymous, and receive up to £20,000. "By doubling the incentives for informants we are also effectively doubling the risk for …

Business 3 May 2006, 08:59
AMD reportedly 'delays' dual-core Turion debut

One month closer to Merom...

AMD has put back the launch of its upcoming dual-core Turion 64 mobile processors to June, online reports have claimed. If true, the move - which had been forecast - will see the chip family's debut delayed just a month, though it brings the line's debut closer to the arrival of Intel's 'Merom' CPU. AMD's apparent decision to …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 09:15
Intel ships 3.6GHz Pentium D 960

Don't mention it

Intel has begun shipping its latest top-of-the-line 65nm dual-core Pentium D desktop processor, the 3.6GHz 960. The chip maker has yet to launch the part formally, though it did get a casual mention in CEO Paul Otellini's analyst day presentation last week. The 960 was expected to ship late April, and that indeed appears to …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 09:33
Apple wins right to retain fixed-price downloads

Major labels drop insistence on variable pricing

Apple has apparently succeeded in persuading the world's major record labels to re-license their content for sale on its iTunes Music Store (ITMS) for a flat-rate 99 cents - 79 pence in the UK - per track. To date, label executives have been keen to stress their demand for variable pricing - higher prices for new songs, lower …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 09:56
Elvis' first house hits $450k on eBay

Uri Geller makes pitch for historic domicile

Any reader with a spare $450k+ burning a hole in his pocket and interested in acquiring Elvis Presley's first house should make his way down to eBay and get busy with the bidding: Presley bought this Memphis des-res in 1956 with the royalties from Heartbreak Hotel, according to the blurb. It comes with all the expected …

Bootnotes 3 May 2006, 10:06
Ad watchdog fingers Telewest

Yet more confusion

Telewest has been ticked off for not being crystal clear on the availability of its broadband, TV, and phone service. The cableco, which is now part of NTL, ran a radio ad which bragged how "getting broadband couldn't be easier". The commercial went on to urge listeners to get in touch "if you live in a Telewest area and you …

Telecoms 3 May 2006, 10:14
T-Mobile Sidekick III piccy posted on web

Third-gen Hiptop imminent?

Is this the face of Danger's third-generation Hiptop? The company's not saying, of course, and neither is T-Mobile USA, which sells the current Hiptop as the Sidekick II. The shot's said to come from marketing material, presumably being prepared for an upcoming launch. The latest pic matches the machine shown in blurry shots …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 10:18
Nano-friendly Bluetooth stereo adaptor in pipeline

iPod powered

German Bluetooth accessory specialist AnyCom is preparing a wireless stereo audio adaptor for Apple's iPod Nano. The slimline add-on draws its power from the player to beam out songs using the Bluetooth 1.2's Advanced Audio Distribution Profile (A2DP). The unit - dubbed the BluNa - plugs onto the bottom of the Nano, …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 10:44
Piracy reduces Hollywood to penury

Sobbing stars down to last Learjet

Pirated DVDs and illegal net downloads are costing the US movie industry a staggering $6.1bn annually in "global wholesale revenues", according to a Wall Street Journal report. The total - estimated by El Reg as the equivalent of a breast augmentation and facelift for every man, woman and child in California, or the special …

Entertainment 3 May 2006, 10:56
Open source needs charitable help

Brief And the community to pull together

The National Computing Centre, which has been commissioned by the Home Office to promote the use of open source software in charity and community organisations, has opened a survey into the use of software in the sector. If you are a voluntary or community organisation, or an IT supplier to tone, put your tuppeny's in here …

Public Sector 3 May 2006, 11:26
Oracle taking BI seriously

Comment But will it deliver on its promises?

What would happen if the people with one of the best databases for business intelligence were to add tools and applications of a similar class? Well, we shall soon find out, because after the acquisition of Siebel, Oracle have started to merge their product lines, and the resultant solution set is very exciting. Oracle has …

Developer 3 May 2006, 11:27
BT gets tough over broadband usage limits

Someone's gotta pay

BT is tightening up rules governing usage limits for its retail broadband service. From this month, punters who exceed their monthly usage limits are to be emailed about upgrading their packages. Subscribers of BT's Option 4 package - which costs £29.99 a month and includes a 40 gig limit - will also be warned about their usage …

Telecoms 3 May 2006, 11:28
UMD format's outlook 'bleak', warns analyst

Content providers not responding to user interest

US market watcher NPD has described the outlook for Sony's PlayStation Portable-friendly UMD format as "bleak". PSP users are not opposed to the disc format, but they're finding the range of available content limited and the price uncompetitive, the researcher said this week. NPD bases the prognostication on a survey of …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 11:29
Murdoch wants teenagers'...

...digital identities, says campaigner

Teenagers should beware of Murdoch-owned website MySpace.com snatching their digital identities, child campaigners have warned. Freechildsafeweb.com, which lobbies for the safe use of MySpace, said small print in the new terms and conditions, introduced since the acquisition of MySpace by News Corporation last year, could mean …

Music and Media 3 May 2006, 11:32
Street scum-busting lamppost spotted in London

Nazi 'camera-shout-pole' hits the capital

Back in March last year we carried a chilling report into the Q Star FlashCam-530 shouting lamppost "currently being deployed across the nation". The US-developed FlashCam is designed to issue verbal warnings to street ne'er-do-wells, miscreants and scalliwags, thereby cutting outdoor mischief to zero overnight. That's the …

Bootnotes 3 May 2006, 13:35
Linux hater/traitor turns to Windows

Communist hackers laughed Shelley out of town?

Internet satirist Shelley the Republican has embraced Microsoft Windows, barely 10 days since publishing a tongue-in-cheek diatribe that painted the open source community as a bunch of communist hackers. Shelley side kick Tristan wrote a weblog that asserted the free, open source operating system Linux, a rival to the …

Operating Systems 3 May 2006, 13:48
Renegade spammer targets junk mail registry

Red mist over Blue Security

Users of Blue Security's controversial anti-spam system have begun receiving email threats that they'll end up getting even more junk mail unless they opt-out of its network. Blue has created a "Do Not Intrude Registry" (akin to the Do Not Call Registry for telemarketing) with around 450,000 members. Participants download a …

Spam 3 May 2006, 13:51
Summer slot for Sky's broadband launch

Details 'pretty soon'

Sky is to launch its residential broadband service this summer, the satellite TV operator said today. Despite a string of questions by analysts earlier today, Sky boss James Murdoch declined to spill the beans on Sky's plans for broadband following its £211m acquisition of local loop unbundling (LLU) operator Easynet last year …

Telecoms 3 May 2006, 13:55
Nokia ships E61 'BlackBerry beater'

E70 coming later this month

Nokia's would-be antidote to Research in Motion's BlackBerry, the E61 smart phone, has started to ship, the handset giant said today. Initial units went out late last week, the company admitted, as it begins to ramp up global shipments. The revelation, made in a Reuters report, follows a deal struck between Nokia and iPass to …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 13:56
LinuxWorld Expo in Windows Server shocker

Penguins sell out to Beast of Redmond

Linux jockeys: prepare your world to be rocked to the very foundation of discarded pizza boxes and crumpled tissues on which it rests. No, the news is not that Perving Jedi has closed his Natalie Portman nip-slip website, but rather that LinuxWorld 2006 Conference & Expo is batting for the other side - and when we say the other …

Servers 3 May 2006, 13:59
LG pours Chocolate into Europe

Slimline KG800 handset goes on sale

South Korea's LG today brought its KG800 phone - informally dubbed 'Chocolate' - to Europe in the hope the slimline slider handset will experience the same success here as it has back home. Chocolate's a 9.5 x 4.8 x 1.5cm phone with a 2in, 176 x 220, 256,000-colour display. It's a tri-band (900/1800/1900MHz) GSM/GPRS device …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 14:02
RIM re-targets SMEs with free server software

Cost of entry lowered

Research in Motion (RIM) is offering a free copy of its BlackBerry server software in the hope of persuading more small businesses to buy into its push email service, long perceived as a big-business offering. The SME version is - functionally, at least - identical to the BlackBerry Enterprise Server standard offering, …

Small Biz 3 May 2006, 14:11
SanDisk Sansa c150 2GB MP3 player

UK Exclusive Can SanDisk swipe the iPod Shuffle's market share?

Everyone wants to be the 'iPod beater'. SanDisk is one of the latest to try its hand, and its introduction of Sansa-branded players last year brought it some success at the low-end of the market. Suitably encouraged, it's launched the Sansa c150, its first MP3 player with a colour screen and the ability to give the competition a …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 14:51
Industry and academia line up to bash ID cards

MPs hear 2009 roll-out unlikely

The Commons Science and Technology Select Committee has heard a 2009 roll-out for ID cards is unlikely. The comments came from London School of Economics (LSE) panelist Dr Edgar Whitley, one of the group behind the highly contentious report that put the upper limit on the scheme's cost at £19bn. Whitley's doubts on the 2009 …

Public Sector 3 May 2006, 14:53
Hackers libel Canadian PM on train signs

Harper 'eats babies' taunt confuses commuters

Bewildered Toronto train passengers were left scratching their heads after a hacker altered advertising signs to announce that Stephen Harper, the country's prime minister, "eats babies". An unidentified ne'er-do-well broke into systems controlling electronic signs on Toronto's westbound Lakeshore GO Transit train to substitute …

Enterprise Security 3 May 2006, 15:01
All quiet on the malware front

Virus-ladened emails hit record low

The volume of virus-ladened emails dropped to a record low last month, according to email security firm BlackSpider Technologies. It reports that virus contaminated emails accounted for just 0.79 per cent of inbound emails during April 2006. In December 2005 the number of virus-infected emails reached 3.93 per cent of all …

Anti-Virus 3 May 2006, 15:13
Colt happy with paying top whack for spectrum

C&W gloats over 'common sense' bid

Colt has denied it paid over the odds for a spectrum licence that enables the development of private GSM mobile phone networks in office buildings or campuses. Details of the 1781.7-1785MHz paired with 1876.7-1880MHz spectrum auction were released today as regulator Ofcom confirmed that the 12 licences which have been awarded …

Mobile 3 May 2006, 15:23
MacBook owners plan mass whine about whining laptops

Support call flood scheduled

A loose affiliation of MacBook Pro owners who together might be called the Apple Noise Abatement Society is calling on fellow users to join them in a worldwide day of action to protest at what they maintain is Apple's unwillingness to solve the noisy notebook issue. And since the new Intel-based portable Macs seems have a …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 15:26
X marks the bug

Linux component flaw deemed 'critical'

Security researchers have discovered a critical vulnerability in the X Window system used in Unix and Linux systems. The buffer overflow vulnerability creates a means for hackers to seize root access to vulnerable systems or launch denial of service attacks. So it's just as well that patches are available. The flaw stems from …

Enterprise Security 3 May 2006, 15:46
Texas wants rich geeks, while AMD will settle for the poor

WCIT Bidness is business

The World Congress on Information Technology (WCIT) kicked off today in Austin with a pair of diverging pleas. Texas Governor Rick Perry made his pitch to big business, while AMD CEO Hector Ruiz hawked his gear to the poor. Speaking to IT leaders from around the globe, Perry delivered exactly the type of speech you might expect …

Hardware 3 May 2006, 15:52
Sun illuminates new storage strategy

Self-aware applications? Blimey

Sun has promised the world simple management of unlimited piles of data. It says its ZFS 128-bit file system, unleashed as part of a spray of storage announcements from the firm, is capable of storing 16bn times more data than current platforms. The news blitz represents the first harvest from Sun's annexing of StorageTek last …

Storage 3 May 2006, 15:54
AMD quad-core Opterons to gain L3 cache in 2008?

Roadmap Gaining FB-DIMM support too, report suggests

AMD is scheduled to launch quad-core Opteron processors capable of supporting Fully Buffered DIMM memory and sporting an extra level of cache shared by each of the fourt cores, it has been claimed in a roadmap-revealing report online. According to Japanese-language site PCWatch, AMD's second-generation quad-core Opterons will …

Reg Hardware 3 May 2006, 16:01
Skype to enable 100-way confusion

Skype 2.5 beta available now

VoIP fans can download a beta of Skype 2.5 from the firm’s website as of today, though there is no word on when the final version will ship. Improved conference calling is one of the features being highlighted in Skype 2.5, with speakers’ pictures being flashed up when they talk. That might come in handy if you’re a little …

VoIP 3 May 2006, 16:24
ADIC buy helps Quantum leap into enterprise

$770m storage buy

Quantum has set its heart on cracking the enterprise market and is coughing up $770m to buy rival storage vendor Advanced Digital Information Corp. Quantum is banking on the deal to massively expands its sales force and channel operation, particularly in the enterprise market where ADIC typically plays. Quantum said it would be …

Storage 3 May 2006, 16:59
IT: – Still the Black Hole of the Balance Sheet?

Measuring the cost of IT ownership could be misleading unless you can also measure the value being delivered.

IT: – Still the Black Hole of the Balance Sheet?” was the title of an interesting media roundtable organised by Managed Objects. It discussed measuring the cost/benefit of IT in the business, although a research survey (of almost 300 IT and business managers) commissioned by Managed Objects as a basis for the discussion, …

Hardware 3 May 2006, 18:04
Cray places order for Opteron Helper

FPGA supercomputer booster

Cray has turned to a small start-up for possible help with its grand plan to win a multi-million dollar contract from the US government. Cray this week announced that it will use a specialized coprocessor from DRC to slot into its Opteron-based systems. The DRC product – an FPGA (field programmable gate array) module – will …

Servers 3 May 2006, 18:08
Ballmer impressed by Intel's new laptop for the poor

WCIT We care enough to talk

The weird battle to provide PCs to the underprivileged continues to hot up with Intel today announcing a new type of kiddie laptop due out in 2007. The Eduwise notebook made its grand entrance here at the World Congress on Information Technology (WCIT) with Intel CEO Paul Otellini unveiling the product. The laptop has a Trapper …

Public Sector 3 May 2006, 21:34
Tom Arnold - MSN's secret weapon against Google

'Lovably flawed'

Last week Microsoft alarmed investors by saying it would spend $2bn more than expected to take on web rivals including Google. The overspend led Goldman Sachs analyst Rick Sherlund to ask Microsoft's chief financial officer Chris Liddell whether Microsoft is building a secret weapon, a Google or a Yahoo!, inside the company. …

Music and Media 3 May 2006, 22:11