|
 |
 Topic: Industry NewsThe new items published under this topic are as follows.
|
|
|
|
Queue (08/05) Vol. 3, No. 6, P. 26; Foster, Ian; Tuecke, Steven
The enterprise IT environment's transition to distributed, low-cost, and frequently heterogeneous collections of servers has fragmented the architecture into segregated silos, and reintegration must take place so that the new environment can support the advantages of vertical decoupling and horizontal integration.
Many popular terms are floating around and breeding confusion, but they all relate to the move from vertically integrated silos to horizontally integrated, service-oriented systems. Grid is an umbrella term for solutions that relate to the flexible use of distributed resources for various applications, while grid infrastructure speaks of a layer for horizontal infrastructure integration.
The meaning of utility computing and on-demand coincide with that of grid in that they refer to IT as service; data center automation seeks to automate operations on applications that are usually not modified for distributed execution. Service-oriented architectures (SOAs) are collections of services for interface separation and deployment necessary to facilitate compatibility, location transparency, and loose service/client coupling, while Web services are a set of technologies needed to bring SOAs into being. A horizontally integrated, service-oriented enterprise IT architecture involves applications using workload managers to coordinate access to physical resources through a common grid infrastructure layer for managing that supports resource modeling, monitoring and notification, allocation, provisioning, life-cycle management, decommissioning, and accounting and auditing.
The grid infrastructure must deploy management capabilities consistently across heterogeneous resources while avoiding vendor lock-in through standardization and open source software, and efforts in these areas are proceeding quickly.
Click Here to View Full Article
|
|
| (752 Reads) |
  |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Once Hurricane Katrina has taken a final swipe at Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi, the American Red Cross will begin quickly deploying satellite communications and other IT systems in affected areas to help storm victims begin piecing their lives back together.
As the storm approached the Southern U.S. late last week, the Washington-based Red Cross began sending equipment and personnel to areas outside the storm's projected path so help could be brought in quickly after the winds and flooding subside. Katrina made landfall in Louisiana early this morning with sustained winds of 145 mph, but veered just enough to the east to spare New Orleans a direct blow. Even so, flooding, power outages and heavy damage to structures were reported throughout the region.
The Red Cross tomorrow expects to begin deploying a host of systems it will need, including satellite telephones, portable satellite dishes, specially equipped communications trucks, high- and low-band radio systems, and generator-powered wireless computer networks, said Jason Wiltrout, a Red Cross network engineer.
Nine specially designed Ford Excursion sport utility trucks, dubbed Emergency Communications Response Vehicles (ECRV), include various radio systems that allow communications on a wide range of frequencies across disaster areas, Wiltrout said. The vehicles haveVery Small Aperture Terminal generator-equipped satellite dishes that can help establish communications in the absence of working phone lines and cell phone towers.
Read the full article
|
|
| (507 Reads) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
UCSD News (08/30/05); Ramsey, Doug
The University of California, San Diego's James Anderson has invented a technique that allows a file to be transferred automatically from one computer to other devices. The graduate student's invention, known as transparent synchronization, or Tsync, has drawn the attention of Google, which helped Anderson finish the coding and issue an open-source beta version under the GNU General Public License; Tsync retains consistency among file sets of different computers, PDAs, and third-generation cell phones, ensuring connectivity among the disparate machines.
Anderson's work was part of Google's Summer of Code initiative, where the search-engine company encouraged student programmers to develop innovative open-source code. Anderson owes the idea for his project to the frustration he felt when having to manually transfer files back and forth among the four computers he uses at work and home.
Anderson's central innovation is automating the transfer process, whereas existing synchronization programs, such as Rsync and Unison, require manual updates, linking files only between two devices; by contrast, Tsync scripts a configuration file that defines which directories are to be synchronized and identifies which hosts are part of the group. The peer-to-peer and overlay techniques ensure that many hosts can be synchronized, and a root fail-over protocol is dispatched that keeps each node connected and manages the update process.
Anderson wrote Tsync in C++ and Mace and tested it on clustered systems on wide-area networks.
Click Here to View Full Article
|
|
| (569 Reads) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
The deluge of spam that pours into email inboxes each day could by curtailed using software that learns to identify the routes taken by unwanted messages, researchers say.
A team from IBM and Cornell University in New York state, US, developed the anti-spam technique, which they call "SMTP Path Analysis". It involves examining information embedded in email messages about the route it has taken across the internet. This allows it to make a good guess as to whether or not a new message is electronic junk mail.
The algorithm at the heart of SMTP Path Analysis studies Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) information, which is added to an email message "header" as it is passed between servers on the internet. This remains hidden when a message arrives in a recipient's inbox but can be used retrace its steps between different mail servers.
Most spam filters try to catch spam by looking at the content of a message, rather than its hidden header. Many already learn to identify new spam by examining previous message. But spammers are constantly coming up with new tricks in an effort to outwit such content-filtering techniques.
Read the Complete Story
|
|
| (317 Reads) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Web services has had its ups and downs since its rise to prominence early in the decade.
Although the vendors backing Web services are confident they are properly addressing any kinks, Web services remains hobbled by issues such as standardization and WSDL complexity. To make matter worse, its impacts are growing, with both the .Net and Java development technologies focusing on Web services. Additionally, Web services is doing double duty as the lynchpin of the growing SOA trend.
RouteOne, a hosted service that processes credit applications for car loans, is a business built on Web services. The company started developing specifications for its business operations in September 2002 and was in a pilot phase by July 2003. It estimates it has since processed millions of transactions via Web services.
“We could not have done it in the timeframe in which we wanted to do it,” if not for Web services, said T.N. Subramaniam, director of technology and chief architect at RouteOne.
Corillian, which provides retail online banking, goes one better when asked about its level of Web services processing. “I think it’s probably incalculable,” said Scott Hanselman, chief architect at Corillian. “You’re talking billions [of Web services calls], I would say.”
Read the Complete Story
|
|
| (271 Reads) |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Is ninjalord — who just went all-in on the flop without a face card showing — a cutthroat poker mercenary? Is RU2Chicken, aggressively betting into each pot with junk cards, a pre-teen trying to emulate his heroes from the nightly televised poker shows? Is the Unabomber at your table really poker pro Phil Laak — who goes by that intimidating nickname on the pro poker tour?
No one knows the answers to these questions. And, since the advent of online poker, that's rarely been problematic.
The cloak of anonymity has been the acceptable tradeoff for cardsmiths elated with the ability to play poker at anytime from anywhere.
But that's quickly changing as a menace far more serious than an underwear-clad novice raising the pot before the flop with a 2-7 in his hand slowly creeps its way into many of these rooms. That threat is the poker bot, a computer program designed to play nearly statistically flawless poker.
"There are a lot of people out there that have seen the opportunity to make money out there and have built online poker bots and are being deceitful," says Dr. Jonathan Schaeffer, a professor of computer science at the University of Alberta.
Read the Complete Story
|
|
| (338 Reads) |
|
|
|
|
