Celebrating Parallels and its desktop virtualization gift

This week, Parallels announced that it has sold 1 million copies of Parallels Desktop, a utility that lets Intel-based Macs run Windows alongside Mac OS X. Although EMC's VMware unit now offers a similar product, it was Parallels that pioneered this application.
And this application has played a significant role in making the Macintosh more widely acceptable in both personal and business environments, as it got rid of the "what if my app won't run on the Mac?" dilemma that overshadowed Apple for years.
For the masses (including senior execs who sign IT project checks), Parallels defines virtualization. And that's a good thing, as it works quite well. I believe that the Parallels example will be a key factor beyond the Mac universe: It will show a successful use of virtualization on the desktop, where its benefits are far from widely realized.
That can only help make the case for desktop virtualization [...]

Original Post By Google News Galen Gruman

Microsoft’s XP intransigence is simply mystifying; can Dell save the day?

You have to wonder what's going on a Microsoft when it comes to the issue of keeping XP available past the planned June 30 cutoff date.
The company clearly knows that Vista was hardly its best moment, an ungainly OS forced out the door after years of delay so Microsoft would have something new to sell. A triumph of short-term thinking that is turning out to be a Pyrrhic victory. But Dell may offer the face-saving out for Microsoft that also saves XP.
Decidedly mixed signals, so why the line in the sand for XP?
While both chairman Bill Gates and CEO Steve Ballmer tout Vista as great, both have also given signals they don't really believe that.
In January, Gates soberly noted that there were lessons to be learned from Vista's development and slow uptake.
A week ago, Ballmer described Vista as a "work in progress" -- not exactly a compliment from [...]

Original Post By Google News Galen Gruman

OLPC’s open source qualms underscores a larger limit

It's all very noble. MIT researcher and pundit Nicholas Negroponte challenges the PC industry to develop and sell a $100 PC for poor countries so their populations can be computer-literate and thus more able to compete in a global economy. He then puts his money where his mouth is and establishes the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) organization, which then develops a $200 laptop to help achieve those goals.
Early on, OLPC decides to go open source, to save money on the software on these ultracheap PCs as well as to get a leaner OS than what the commercial world offers. Less intensive equipment is needed, reducing costs even further.
Now we see that OLPC may switch to Windows XP, as Negroponte says that the open source Sugar GUI on the Linux-based OLPC is inferior in several ways, including being able to run the Flash files common to educational Web sites.
Negroponte is [...]

Original Post By Google News Galen Gruman

Microsoft reaches for the cloud

At a press briefing Tuesday, Microsoft Chief Operating Officer Kevin Turner put some meat on the bones of Microsoft's "software plus services" strategy to deliver cloud computing capabilities to customers. Turner reviewed Microsoft's current on-demand offerings -- mainly Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online, plus hosted versions of Exchange and SharePoint -- but also revealed that major new announcements would follow at the Microsoft Partner Conference in early July.
When asked whether Microsoft plans to offer a development platform in the cloud, Turner grinned and said pointedly: "We are not announcing anything today." Given the strength of Microsoft's developer base, and the recent announcement of Google App Engine as a cloud-based development platform, Microsoft has every incentive to launch a hosted platform for developing Web applications as soon as possible.
[As Microsoft and other vendors reveal new services, the platform lock-in game moves to the cloud, thereby bringing an entirely new set of risks [...]

Original Post By Google News Eric Knorr

Perceptive Pixel

Perceptive Pixel is one of our 2008 top 10 technology startups. The video below shows this remarkable company's technology in action, but you can also read about it here.

Original Post By Google News Bill Snyder

It’s JavaOne, but where’s Scott?

Scott McNealy, who was the longtime CEO of Sun Microsystems and still is company chairman, has been absent from the company's JavaOne conference in San Francisco this week.
A longtime fixture at the event even after stepping down as CEO in 2006, McNealy instead is in Washington, DC on business for Sun Federal, a Sun subsidiary that works with federal government accounts. McNealy is president of Sun Federal.
McNealy had been known for presentations that injected humor into the event, such as offering in 2006 a Top 10 list of advantages to no longer being CEO.

Original Post By Google News Paul Krill

Missing the iPhone’s point

Every week, it seems, some device maker or cellular carrier is announcing its iPhone killer. The latest is the HTC Touch, whose main claim to fame is that it has beat Apple's iPhone to the 3G market (3G being the set of faster cellular networks than what the current iPhone uses). Never mind that the HTC Touch won't ship until June -- around the time that the new 3G iPhone is rumored to launch -- so any claims of being first are premature.
But who cares if the HTC Touch is first to run on 3G networks? Apple has proven that being first is not critical to success. The iPod came years after other MP3 players. The iPhone came years after other so-called smartphones.
Now, I haven't used an HTC Touch, so it could be a worthwhile iPhone competitor. In our last smartphone comparison, InfoWorld chief technologist Tom Yager had good things [...]

Original Post By Google News Galen Gruman

The right Vista strategy: Do nothing

Most analyst firms were excited about Windows Vista in 2006, when it was on the verge of being released. But for several firms, that enthusiasm withered as it became clear that Vista is a flawed OS that few users actually want.
Gartner has been among the most consistent doubters of Vista, warning businesses in November 2005 that the Vista migration would be long and slow, with most IT shops not able to fully deploy it until 2009 -- advice it still holds to. And today its view on Vista has soured considerably.
[ Tell Microsoft to keep XP indefinitely: Sign our petition, and add your voice to our video pleas. ]
On the other side, Forrester Research started out cautious, estimating in 2006 that Vista upgrade momentum would be small compared to that for XP -- a view it reiterated in 2007. But more recently, Forrester's analysis has taken a "glass half full" [...]

Original Post By Google News Galen Gruman

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