Stories about: Resorts Worldwide

The WIMP human-computer interface may have an uninspiring name, but Windows, Icons, Menus and Pointing devices have dominated computing for some 15 years. The keyboard, mouse and display screen have served users extraordinarily well.

Service-oriented architecture promises many positives: resource reuse, application integration, business agility and infrastructure flexibility, among others. But never do SOA proponents claim ease of management as one of the technology's glories.

Microsoft has chosen what it sees as the next-generation in PC form factors -- a computer the size and shape of a coffee table with a flat, touchscreen display -- as the third major product it has designed and is branding for the consumer electronics market.

EMC Wednesday is expected to announce enhancements to its availability, performance and path management software that will help customers maintain uptime while migrating data or virtualizing their storage environments.

AOL is getting ready to set up an area in Second Life, another in a string of big-name companies establishing a presence in this popular 3D virtual world.

As companies have become increasingly dependent upon electronic transactions as a primary means of customer interaction, many have found that it's no longer adequate to simply monitor overall performance. For businesses such as Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, monitoring each user's experience has become critical.

Two major systems management vendors separately announced tools Monday for systems monitoring and control of Web applications.

Sonic Software last week brought out a new version of its Actional service-oriented architecture (SOA) management tool that it said will provide business users with more visibility into business processes.

IT managers and staffers at New Orleans-based companies have been working to salvage their systems, data and websites, some not knowing whether they still had viable businesses to support or homes that they could return to.

When John Schindler thinks of enterprise resource planning software, business flexibility isn't exactly the first phrase that leaps to mind, he says. But increasingly, that's what he and other users are demanding from their ERP vendors. "We're in a growth mode, and the business needs are changing," says Schindler, CIO at Kichler Lighting Group. The problem is that today's ERP systems haven't adapted quickly enough to those change requirements.

HP's troubled Enterprise Storage and Servers group has bounced back to profitability during its most recent financial quarter, and the company overall revenue rose 8 per cent to $US21.4 billion.