SCCMNAP

November 11, 2010
Microsoft will supply the software. Intel will bring the hardware, and NEC will work on the applications and integration. Together, they hope to expand and mature the digital signage market, announcing a strategic alliance that aims to develop a prototype to exhibit at the National Retail Foundation’s conference in January.

The new collaboration builds on an existing digital-signage partnership between Microsoft and Intel, announced at the NRF’s show at the beginning of the year. The new digital signage platform will be based on Windows Embedded Standard 7 and powered by Intel’s Core i5/i7 processors. Small Business Computing has the story.

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NEC, Intel and Microsoft announced Wednesday that they’re planning a strategic alliance aimed at creating a next-generation platform for digital signage using the three companies’ technologies.

"The proposed collaboration will result in an optimized digital signage platform that addresses the retail and digital signage market’s need for a more streamlined, high-performance and highly reliable solution that supports digital content, interactivity, intelligence and life-cycle management," a joint statement said.

Read the full story at Small Business Computing:
Microsoft, Intel and NEC Team on Digital Signage Platform

TAGS: Intel, e-commerce, Microsoft, NEC, digital signage

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November 10, 2010

Microsoft is pressing ahead with its SQL Server database offering, releasing community technology preview (CTP) copies of a product codenamed Denali that offers multi-state clustering, among other features.

Additionally, Microsoft rolled out what it’s billing as the Microsoft Critical Advantage Program (MCAP), which provides a litany of services and support offerings. Server Watch has the details on Microsoft’s latest SQL Server offering.

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Microsoft gave out the first community technology preview (CTP) copies of the next generation of its SQL Server enterprise database product — codenamed Denali — to developers gathered in Seattle for the Professional Association for SQL Server (PASS) Summit 2010, Tuesday.

Besides the CTP, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) announced general availability of SQL Server 2008 R2 Parallel Data Warehouse (PDW). PASS is an independent, not-for-profit, SQL Server organization.

Read the full story at Server Watch:
Microsoft Releases SQL Server ‘Denali’ Preview

 

TAGS: Windows, Microsoft, SQL, SQL Server, Denali

November 4, 2010

Backtracking or clarifying? In an attempt reassure developers that it won’t pull the rug out from underneath them after it has spent three years convincing them that it is the future platform for streaming media, President of Microsoft’s (NASDAQ: MSFT) Server and Tools Division, Bob Muglia, said in a follow up blog post this week that Silverlight remains "strategic."

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After telling an interviewer late last week that the role of Silverlight in the scheme of things has "shifted" — thus setting off fears in some observers’ and developers’ minds that the cross-platform, cross-browser streaming media technology is being dead ended — the president of the division that has purview over its future admits that he miscommunicated.

Read the full story at CodeGuru.com:
Microsoft Says HTML 5 Won’t Kill Silverlight

November 5, 2010

Like any war, the battle among mobile vendors is sure to have its share of casualties. The latest to take a hit is RIM’s BlackBerry line.

As Enterprise Mobile Today reports, Dell plans to ditch the BlackBerrys used by its 25,000 employees in favor of new Dell Venue Pro phones the company is getting ready to release. But RIM (NASDAQ: RIMM) calls the move a marketing stunt and disputes Dell’s claim the move will save it money.

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Nice knowing you, BlackBerry. Dell plans to replace 25,000 employee’s BlackBerrys with its own soon-to-be-released Dell Venue Pro phones from T-Mobile running Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 software.

According to a report in the The Wall Street Journal, Dell also plans to start marketing a service to clients later this month designed to help them make a similar switch.

Read the full story at Enterprise Mobile Today:
Dell Ditches 25,000 BlackBerrys

 

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Cloud computing is an industry transformation. Cloud computing enables businesses of all sizes to deliver IT as a service, offering new possibilities to focus more on business success and less on operational costs and maintenance.

 

 

Read More Now! – http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/cloud/default.aspx#tab2-small

November 3, 2010

Windows 7 uptake among businesses has been slow so far, but that could be about to change, according to a new Forrester Research report.

Windows XP has been stubbornly hanging on in enterprises, but as the economy emerges from recession and older PCs limit productivity, Windows 7 appears poised to take off. And that could boost Microsoft’s already strong earnings. Datamation has the scoop.

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Windows 7 has so far been "far from overwhelming" in gaining adoption among both enterprises and small and medium businesses (SMB), according to a new survey, but now it is poised for a surge in deployments.

Forrester Research (NASDAQ: FORR) found, in a recent survey of nearly 800 PC decision makers in enterprises and SMBs in North America and Europe, that 10 percent of PCs in businesses are running Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) Windows 7 today. That’s up from just 1 percent a year ago.

In fact, the survey found that 46 percent either have specific plans to deploy Windows 7 in the next 12 months, or have already begun their migrations.

Read the full story at Datamation:

Windows 7 Business Upgrades Ready for Take Off

TAGS: Microsoft, PC sales, Windows 7, upgrade cycle

November 3, 2010

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg unveiled a trio of new features for the social networking site’s mobile platform, including something called Deals that will give local merchants and vendors the opportunity to immediately and directly market and advertise to mobile users.

As Enterprise Mobile Today reports, the new features should make life easier for mobile users who want to stay connected to their friends and coworkers via their smartphones.

Zuckerberg was quick to point out that Facebook’s more than 200 million users have downloaded his company’s mobile app for all different mobile OSs and devices, up from 65 million at this time last year.

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Facebook today rolled out some intriguing new features for its mobile platform designed to make it easier for its 500 million-plus users to easily access information and share their experiences from their smartphones.

The announcements came during the company’s special mobile event presentation at its Palo Alto, Calif. headquarters. While there was considerable scuttlebutt and unsubstantiated rumors suggesting Facebook would be unveiling a new branded smartphone of its own, Zuckerberg was quick to set the record straight.

"Um, no," he said to crowd, many of whom were expecting to hear about a new type of Facebook-branded smartphone or mobile device, adding that the company’s goal was to "make things social."

Read the full story at Enterprise Mobile Today:
Facebook Spruces Up Mobile Platform With Location-Based Services

TAGS: Facebook, smartphone, social media, Facebook API

Despite an increased focus on project management, an alarming number of IT projects still fail. Common obstacles to successful projects include feature creep, lack of cooperation, and inefficient processes. Download this Internet.com eBook to learn techniques for overcoming project jams and for improving the way you manage project information.

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Visit DevX for More Information – http://www.devx.com/ebook/Article/38174

Introducing a more personalized search.

Bing has connected with Facebook to make searching on Bing more social. Together, Bing and Facebook offer you better search results and a more personalized experience with the help of your Facebook friends. Your friends introduce you to new music, restaurants, movies, and more. Now Bing helps you discover what they have “liked” and shared on the web.

Learn More

What do you do when you’re locked in a battle for network access market share with the world’s largest networking provider? If you’re Nortel, you team up with one of the world’s largest software providers.

Nortel is strengthening its Microsoft integration by supporting Microsoft’s Network Access Protection (NAP) and its critical Statement of Health (SOH) protocol. The move, Nortel said, is to help enterprises contend with one of the key barriers of access control adoption, namely complexity.

Nortel’s Secure Network Access (SAN) technologies now fully support SOH, which helps determine the security posture of an endpoint. With the full embrace of NAP, Nortel is placing itself in the Microsoft camp as an alternative to Cisco’s Network Access Control (NAC).

READ THE FULL STORY – http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/netsys/article.php/3713846/Nortel-Bets-on-Microsoft-NAP.htm

November 1, 2010

Microsoft loves to go on about the future potential of what is called "natural user interface" or NUI. Although NUI includes technologies such as voice recognition and computerized transcription, Microsoft — among other companies — has been just as committed to the idea of using gestures in three-dimensional space to control systems. In fact, it’s so committed it just bought a company to help it more forward.

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Microsoft has confirmed that it has reached an agreement to acquire a small California firm that specializes in 3D sensing technologies.

Sunnyvale-based Canesta announced the purchase by Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) on its website Friday. What Microsoft gets for its money includes 44 patents, as well as many others that Canesta has filed for, regarding its single-chip 3D sensing platform.

Read the full story at Hardware Central:
Microsoft Buys Natural User Interface Firm

1. Are you fighting with keeping Configuration Manager clients agents installed?
2. Do end users find a way to circumvent the client deployment process?
3. Do clients roam and assign to other sites you did not plan for?
4. Do you need a solution to automatically reinstall SCCM clients?
5. Want to deploy the client using the Software Update feature WSUS?
6. Want to ensure and maintain clients assigned to a specific site code?
7. Want to install the client based on the domain the desktop is joined to?
8. Want to install the client based on the OU the desktop is a member of?
9. Want to provision and install clients using Active Directory GPO?

The following Article will help you reach 100% client Reach, Discovery, Remediation & Deployment. It’s the best solution that is already right at your fingertips.

Implemented By Richard Dixon at Microsoft for over 200,000 managed clients by System Center Configuration Manager 2007 R2. This solution replaced Microsoft use of a client deployment logon script.

Read More @ Details for obtaining 100% ConfigMgr Client Installation & Reach

System Center Configuration Manager (ConfigMgr or SCCM), formerly Systems Management Server (SMS), is a systems management software product by Microsoft for managing large groups of Windows-based computer systems. Configuration Manager provides remote control, patch management, software distribution, operating system deployment, network access protection, and hardware and software inventory.

There have been three major iterations of SMS. The 1.x versions of the product defined the scope of control of the management server (the site) in terms of the NT domain that was being managed. Since the 2.x versions, that site paradigm has switched to a group of subnets that will be managed together. Since SMS 2003, the site could also be defined as one or more Active Directory sites. The most frequently used feature is inventory management, which provides both hardware and software inventory across a business enterprise.

The major difference between the 2.x product and SMS 2003 is the introduction of the Advanced Client. The Advanced Client communicates with a more scalable management infrastructure, namely the Management Point. A Management Point (MP) can manage up to twenty five thousand Advanced Clients.

The Advanced Client was introduced to provide a solution to the problem that a managed laptop might connect to a corporate network from multiple locations and should not always download content from the same place within the enterprise (though it should always receive policy from its own site). When an Advanced Client is within another location (SMS Site), it may use a local distribution point to download or run a program which can conserve bandwidth across a WAN.

Microsoft announced the next generation of the product, System Center Configuration Manager 2007 (code name "V4") at the Microsoft Management Summit in April 2005. The product was released to manufacturing in August of 2007 and was available for general release in November of 2007. A free evaluation edition of System Center Configuration Manager 2007 is available on the Microsoft download center.

Technorati Tags: SCCM,System,Configuration,Manger,Version,History,Center,Manager,ConfigMgr,Systems,Management

The Appirio-sponsored survey of IT decision-makers, highlights both cloud computing’s potential and misconceptions that could be limiting its wider adoption.

October 29, 2010

For more on cloud computing and the enterprise, visit Internet.com’s new cloud computing site.

As more enterprises investigate the potential and promise of cloud computing, the technology itself and the pros and cons of different vendor’s solutions are coming into sharper focus.

Datamation reports on a survey of IT decision-makers at mid- to large-sized companies who have adopted at least one cloud or SaaS application. As the article details, those participating in the survey had some definite views on what’s holding back wider adoption of cloud computing solutions and they also shared their own priorities related to their use and adoption of cloud-based solutions.

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Cloud computing is — or should be — on every IT decision maker’s radar, given the potential cost savings and prospects for a more flexible and scalable IT infrastructure.

But moving to the cloud is hardly a slam dunk for many enterprises. First there is the basic issue of the work and resources required to transition to the cloud. Also, security concerns are often cited as the main stumbling block to broader cloud adoption.

Read the full story at Datamation:
IT Survey Spotlights Cloud Computing’s Potential, Misconceptions Technorati Tags: Cloud,Survey,Focus,Spotlights,Potential,Misconceptions