Stories by Eric Lai

Forrester sees online sales through 2010 rising

Consumers' love of online research and purchasing convenience is fueling online retail sales growth, according to a report released Wednesday by Forrester Research.

Novell releases Identity Manager 3

Novell is set to release Identity Manager 3, which it said will speed up the process of managing employee passwords and user access rights inside the corporate network by moving that function away from the IT department. "IT people are not the people who know who should have access to things," said Ferris Argyle, product manager for the Identity Manager software.

Restructuring costs pull Novell into the red

Novell reported unexpectedly strong operating profit and revenue for its fourth quarter, though restructuring expenses pulled the company into the red.

IBM to add native XML storage support to DB2

IBM last week released the initial open beta of a planned update to its flagship DB2 database that will offer users the ability to natively store unstructured XML data separately from conventional relational data.

IBM to add native XML storage support to DB2

IBM last week released the initial open beta of a planned update to its flagship DB2 database that will offer users the ability to natively store unstructured XML data separately from conventional relational data.

Microsoft offers Beta 2 of Compute Cluster Server 2003

Microsoft continues to edge toward the high-performance computing space, releasing Tuesday the second beta of its Windows Server 2003 operating system for clustered systems.

Microsoft unwraps flagship database SQL Server 2005

Microsoft has officially released its flagship database SQL Server 2005, a product the company said is now truly ready for big businesses.

Informatica touts PowerCenter 8 over rival IBM apps

Informatica claims that features in its upcoming PowerCenter 8 data integration software trump those offered by rival IBM.

CrossOver Office aims to ease a switch to Linux

Many self-avowed Microsoft haters have stopped short of switching to Linux when they realized the pain involved with abandoning all of their favorite Windows software.

CA restates financial results

Computer Associates International Wednesday filed restated financial results with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for all but one of its fiscal years between 2000 and 2005, reporting changes that boosted revenues during the period but also raised pretax compensation expenses.

CA buys messaging management software vendor iLumin

Computer Associates International announced plans to buy iLumin Software Services, a move designed to give CA a stake in the fast-growing market for software that manages and archives e-mails and instant messages.

Teen uses worm to boost ratings on MySpace.com

Using a self-propagating worm that exploits a scripting vulnerability common to most dynamic Web sites, a Los Angeles teenager made himself the most popular member of community Web site MySpace.com earlier this month. While the attack caused little damage, the technique could be used to destroy Web site data or steal private information -- even from enterprise users behind protected networks, according to an Internet security firm.

Gartner: US IT spending to rise in 2006

Led by small to medium-size businesses, IT spending in the U.S. will increase by 5.5 percent in 2006, although the job market for IT workers will remain "challenging," Gartner said Wednesday.

Browser wars: Netscape gains as Firefox wanes

A key feature in version 8.0 of Netscape Communication's Web browser may have deflated the Netscape browser's market share by as much as half earlier this year -- while artificially boosting the market share of rivals Firefox and Internet Explorer, a Web tracking firm said Tuesday.

New Firefox beta released

The Mozilla Foundation has released a second beta of the Firefox 1.5 Web browser that, like the first version released last month, focuses on tackling nagging security issues.