Latest News from iPhone Developer's Journal

blinkx Kickstarts Holiday Season with Festive Videos

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 10:15:00 EST

To help you gear up for the holidays, blinkx has researched and compiled some of the season's best holiday-themed videos. Trimming the perfect tree, researching the latest must-have gadgets, making a flawless batch of eggnog, and discovering the finest holiday tunes are a snap this year with blinkx. Visit www.blinkx.com/topics/holidays for the greatest how-to videos, and visit blinkx Music (www.music.blinkx.com) to start compiling this year's holiday soundtrack.

Doesn’t Anybody Look Things Up Anymore?

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 13:00:00 EST

This may feel like Christmas when all you get is ties but Samsung is launching its own smartphone operating system called bada, which it expects to compete with Android and LiMo. It’s not yet clear exactly what it is. Could be still another Linux variant. More likely it’s Samsung’s proprietary operating system with a new front-end. Samsung says it’ll be open so third-party developers can write to it and it’ll be backed by an app store. Carriers will be able to customize the thing. The first bada-based phones are scheduled to be out in 2H10. An SDK will be available in December 1. The word bada means ocean in Korean. Unfortunately it’s also a Shia Moslem concept of God.

Cloud Computing Scenario: Extracting Business Value From the Hype

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 14:00:00 EST

Gartner Application Architecture, Development & Integration Summit, Dec 7-9 in Las Vegas. Learn the latest on Cloud computing, SOA, Event Processing, Agile, Application governance, Application development life cycle, Application and data integration, Application modernization, and more.

Top 10 Telecom Predictions for 2010

Wed, 11 Nov 2009 14:00:00 EST

“The industry is at an inflection point that is perhaps more significant than at any juncture in North American telecom history,” says Rob Chimsky, inCode Telecom Vice President and CTO. “Incremental revenue is shifting from voice to data. However, threats from new competitors offering ‘over-the-top’ business models emphasizing value delivered by applications directly to consumers, rather than simple connectivity, will reshape the industry.”n Each year, telecom watchers await the inCode predictions, known for their insight and accuracy. inCode is one of North America's largest consulting organizations focused on the telecommunications and mobility applications market. The highly experienced consulting team advises top players in the industry including leading wireless, wireline, and cable operators; infrastructure and device suppliers; application and service developers; private equity and venture capital firms; and enterprises that are mobilizing their businesses. Over the previous six years, inCode annual predictions have proved correct about 80 percent of the time.

The Cloud Computing Kettle Heats Right Up

Tue, 10 Nov 2009 01:00:00 EST

The past month has seen an unprecedented concentration of Cloud-related articles, events, tweets, and - above all - product launches, partnership announcements and M&A moves. So is Cloud Computing, after three years, finally coming to the boil? Here, by way of allowing you to judge for yourself, SYS-CON's Cloud Computing Journal brings you a timeline of the trajectory of the Cloud so far.

Using Game Salad for Rapid Game Development for the iPhone

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 12:10:00 EST

Talk to iPhone developers and they will tell you that game development for the iPhone is not hard. OK, that’s great for them, but what about us mere mortals that quake at the thought of having to write code. For us there is now alternative: GameSalad.com GameSalad is two products. The first product is a piece of software you download to your desktop that allows you to build your games. The second is a service you upload your game too and have it converted for your iPhone.

Google Plays the Openness Card

Sun, 08 Nov 2009 07:00:00 EST

While Apple has blocked the Someecards app because some of the cards have made fun of public figures, Google has asked the app to port on over to Android phones. (BTW, I got a Droid today.)

Farewell Old Tech, Hello New Tech

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 21:30:00 EST

It was only a matter of time, especially as with the SDK 3.0, developing for an accessory was made possible. Now within the next few weeks Apple Retail will withdraw the Symbol based devices running Windows CE and replace it with an iPod Touch based device with custom credit card reader. Is that a cheer I hear? I've always wondered when this will happen and initially the roll put will be in the US, but other countries will follow soon after.

Windows 7 Networking Controls Video Screencast

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 15:30:00 EST

This week I begin a new series of video screencasts for Dell’s IT Expert Voice Web site. The site has all sorts of useful information for corporate IT folks that are interested in migrating and using Windows 7, and my humble part will be to produce a regular series of videos similar to what I have been doing on my own over at WebInformant.tv. Do check out this video which talks about the differences between Windows 7 and earlier versions when it comes to networking controls.

Netbiscuits Awarded “Best Mobile Publishing Platform”

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:30:00 EST

Netbiscuits, a leading B2B web software platform for the creation, operation and monetization of mobile websites, was honored as the “Best Mobile Publishing Platform 2009”. Over 400 industry execs made their choice for the prestigious ME Awards and handpicked Netbiscuits from a short list of six finalists from all over the world. Netbiscuits won the prize for the first time and thereby demonstrates the ongoing exceptional success of its software platform globally.

Cloud Computing Expo 2010 East Call for Papers Now Open

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 12:00:00 EDT

The International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo series is the world's leading Cloud-focused event and is held three times a year, in New York, Silicon Valley and in Europe. Over 200 corporate sponsors and 10,000 industry professionals have participated in Cloud Computing Expo since its inception, more than all other Cloud-related events put together. The three-day event will offer a rich array of sessions led by exceptional speakers about the business and technical value of cloud computing with more than 80 sponsors and exhibitors on the 70,000 sq. ft. show floor and over 5,000 estimated delegates from well over 48 different countries.

Apple Introduces Apple TV 3.0 Software With Redesigned User Interface

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 14:30:00 EDT

Apple today introduced new Apple TV 3.0 software featuring a redesigned main menu that makes navigating your favorite content simpler and faster, and makes enjoying the largest selection of on-demand HD movie rentals and purchases, HD TV shows, music and podcasts from the iTunes® Store even better on your TV. You can now enjoy iTunes Extras and iTunes LP in stunning fullscreen with your Apple TV, as well as listen to Genius Mixes and Internet radio through your home theater system. The new Apple TV software is available immediately free of charge to existing Apple TV owners, and Apple TV with 160GB capacity is available for just $229.

Five Days to SYS-CON's iPhone Developer Summit

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 14:15:00 EDT

We are now only 5 days away from SYS-CON's iPhone Developer Summit in Santa Clara, CA. On Tuesday November 3rd the Santa Clara Convension center will be the place where you can hear nine presentations, most related to developing and using the iPhone in the Enterprise.

Push It Up! Implementing Apple's Push Notifications for Fun and Profit

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 12:00:00 EDT

Ever looked into Apple’s Push Notification? If you thought it was as a simple as flicking a switch, think again! Enabling Push in your app is just the start and Joe Pezzillo, Co-Founder of Push IO LLC and the founder of Metafy LLC, will show you how to get your application up and running with Push Notifications in no time.

Amazon's VPC Opens the Door for Innovation and Enterprise Cloud Adoption

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 05:45:00 EDT

The recent announcement from Amazon of the Virtual Private Cloud (VPC) represents the next big advance in the evolution chain for cloud computing. Enterprises can now integrate their IT infrastructure with Amazon's vast computing and storage resources, using a VPN connection from their data center to their own virtual private cloud which then looks like part of their internal network.

Until the release of VPC, companies were left to build applications and utilize the cloud as a separate and somewhat siloed portion of their computing environment. In addition to the VPN connection, VPC allows cloud users to control their IP addressing within the Amazon cloud (previously IT addresses were assigned randomly). This may sound trivial, but it solves some tricky problems that made it hard to integrate cloud and internal resources.

Prior to VPC, every time you started a server in Amazon, you would get a new, randomly assigned IP address for that server. This created a lot of issues with how typical applications operate, e.g.: how do you communicate the address of this new server? How do you run authentication/certificate processes with a changing address? How do you deal with identity when IP addresses change at every start? Add to this the fact that cloud servers were separate from internal servers, so internal services that you normally take advantage of (DNS, LDAP, etc.) were not available without a lot of work. VPC provides a way to connect cloud resources to your data center and start to smooth over the differences.

Okay, how does this work? A standard edge networking device in your data center is configured to connect with Amazon's VPC. You can create your own sub-nets within Amazon, and when you launch a server you assign it to one of them. You specify the IP address range for your servers, and VPC performs the "security dance" to build the VPN between the edge device and your private network in Amazon's cloud. All you have to do is update your routing tables so that processes in the data center can reach applications in the cloud and you're off to the races.

By allowing customers to integrate their data center networks with Amazon's cloud, VPC takes the first step in bringing the cloud and the enterprise data center together. While one large hurdle has been removed, there's still work to be done, as indicated in RightScale's blog. As enterprises review the VPC offering, there are things they need to consider as they determine how to deploy and use it.

Networking: VPC provides a layer-3 connection between the data center and the cloud, which means that traffic is based on IP address routing. You'll have some work to do to figure out things like managing addressing in the cloud, and the implication of MAC addresses changing on every server start. In contrast, the holy grail of this integration is based on the Ethernet level (layer-2), where everything "just works" -- allowing seamless migration of applications between the data center and the cloud (and back). Some applications require layer-2 connectivity (for broadcasting for example), which means they would probably need to remain in your data center.

Security: As the name indicates, VPC doesn't provide truly private infrastructure, but a virtually private infrastructure -- servers deployed into your virtual private cloud are allocated from the same shared resources that Amazon uses for all its customers. Thus, you still have to think about possible additional security measures in the cloud, both for networking (VPC doesn't allow for encryption between servers), as well as how to protect data in shared storage.

Management: Developers will have to deal with the "assembly required" aspect of mapping applications to Amazon's infrastructure. There's no simple way to move existing servers to the cloud, which means you'll have to determine how to provision and configure cloud resources, and how much custom work might be needed to interface with Amazon APIs. Deployment is complicated by Amazon specifics -- how to launch an instance, attach storage resources, reset applications to use the proper storage path, etc. You'll also have to address the fact that base servers run on "ephemeral storage", meaning that server outages cause the loss of all data/updates. (There are many blog posts on this topic; this one is typical.)

Flexibility and choice: Finally, while VPC solves some major headaches for companies that are committed to AWS, it is not applicable for those who want the flexibility of multi-cloud offerings. This is important because users have no control of a cloud provider's infrastructure. When a provider decides to upgrade or change anything, users must go along for the ride.

So to sum up, Amazon's VPC represents an exciting step forward along the road to making the cloud truly enterprise-ready. Cloud computing has come a long way over the last two years, and in many ways Amazon has been setting the pace. Their new offering lays the foundation for the next set of solutions for enterprise adoption from other companies in the cloud computing ecosystem. At CloudSwitch, we're excited to take advantage of the ongoing improvements by Amazon to their infrastructure, and working hard to eliminate complexity and make cloud computing simple, seamless and more cost-effective than ever.

Rapid Application Delivery - Going Hybrid

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 16:00:00 EDT

According to Lee Barney, “You will learn how and why to use the standard UIWebView in your applications in any way from a simple display of easily formatted text.” Barney will be presenting a 45-minute breakout session at iPhone Developer Summit 2009 West, being held November 3rd, 2009, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in conjunction with SYS-CON's 4th International Cloud Computing Expo (November 2-4, 2009).

Key Steps to Developing VoIP-enabled Apps for the iPhone

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 15:30:00 EDT

According to Jan Skoglund, “Trying to cobble a VoIP solution is likely to cause developers severe headaches, time delays and frustration.” Skoglund will be presenting a 45-minute breakout session at iPhone Developer Summit 2009 West, being held November 3rd, 2009, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in conjunction with SYS-CON's 4th International Cloud Computing Expo (November 2-4, 2009).

Selling Products with StoreKit

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 15:30:00 EDT

According to Ernest Svehla, “Iwill include a quick review of key components then present best practices for organizing your products, selecting a selling model, and implementing your approach.” Svehla will be presenting a 45-minute breakout session at iPhone Developer Summit 2009 West, being held November 3rd, 2009, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in conjunction with SYS-CON's 4th International Cloud Computing Expo (November 2-4, 2009).

Design Patterns for Distributed Mobile Applications

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 14:45:00 EDT

According to Jason Christensen, “Patterns are important for consuming ReST based web-services, TCP stream based services, and Push notifications from the iPhone.” Christensen will be presenting a 45-minute breakout session at iPhone Developer Summit 2009 West, being held November 3rd, 2009, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in conjunction with SYS-CON's 4th International Cloud Computing Expo (November 2-4, 2009).

Enabling Enterprise Mobility on the iPhone

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 14:45:00 EDT

According to Senthil Krishnapillai, “As pressures mount on IT departments to allow devices access to complex types of corporate data, iPhone business use must go beyond secure email access.” Krishnapillai will be presenting a 45-minute breakout session at iPhone Developer Summit 2009 West, being held November 3rd, 2009, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in conjunction with SYS-CON's 4th International Cloud Computing Expo (November 2-4, 2009).

Rhomobile CEO to Speak at iPhone Developer Summit 2009 West

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 14:30:00 EDT

With the iPhone more than earning its place in the consumer market, it is now being adopted by enterprises. But just how easy it is to create robust enterprise applications for the iPhone, as well as all the other major mobile platforms? With Ruby and HTML in the cloud, according to Rhombobile CEO Adam Blum, the answer is "Very easy." Blum will be presenting a 45-minute breakout session at iPhone Developer Summit 2009 West, being held November 3rd, 2009, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in conjunction with SYS-CON's 4th International Cloud Computing Expo (November 2-4, 2009).

Negotiating the Virtual/Grid/Cloud Legal Minefield

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 18:00:00 EDT

In this session David Snead will address the legal, business and marketing issues of involved in moving into these new services, and what anyone entering into a new contract, or marketing to end users needs to know. Some areas of discussion include how to create a marketing campaign that capitalizes on the differences between the new world of hosting and the old world, as well simple explanations combined with examples for any business owner that needs to outsource technology.

Enterprise-Level Cloud Computing: Far-Off Dream or Present Reality?

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 15:15:00 EDT

Cloud Computing, the long-held dream of computing as a utility, has the potential to transform a large part of the IT industry, making software even more attractive as a service and shaping the way IT hardware is designed and purchased. But if it is already a commercial reality, why does Richard Stallman call it "worse than stupidity"? What, if any, are the new economic models enabled by Cloud Computing, and how can a service operator decide whether to move to the cloud or stay in a private datacenter? What changes should be made to the design of future applications software, infrastructure software, and hardware to match the needs and opportunities of Cloud Computing? All these questions may leave you wondering, but at the Cloud Computing Conference and Expo, Rob Walters, Willie Tejada, Terry Woloszyn, Barry X Lynn, Adam Blum and Greg O’Connor will be sure to help you to better understand whether Enterprise-Level Cloud Computing is a far-off dream or a present reality.

Building Scalable and Extensible RIAs on Windows Azure

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:00:00 EDT

This session will cover how to enable rich and complete User Experience customizations. According to Ranjith Ramakrishnan and Bhushan Nene, building on the new features of Silverlight 3 and Windows Azure, delegates will see these concepts in action in a demo of a Customer Loyalty Management application.

Migrating Collaborative Applications to the Cloud

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 13:15:00 EDT

The time has finally come for collaboration in the cloud. Multiple offerings and tools are now readily available for your organization to migrate your on-premise collaborative applications (e.g., e-mail, instant messaging, and portals) to the Cloud. Implementation and use of these tools alone, though, will not guarantee your organization a successful migration. Jeffrey Miller will guarantee you that when you leave this session you will be ready to move forward in the successful evaluation and migration of their collaborative applications.

Endpoint Management and Security as a Service

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 12:15:00 EDT

With the push to maximize IT amid the ever shrinking IT budgets, one of the “holy grails” of IT is to use the cloud service model to reduce the TCO for their endpoints whether it is desktops, laptops, or smart mobile phones. Danny Kim will go in-depth into the architecture and deployment of how FullArmor, an innovative vendor that's developed one of the first commercial Windows Azure cloud service, provided full endpoint management, security, and software deployments through the cloud for hundreds of thousands of endpoints in the emerging markets at a fraction of the cost of traditional models.

Cloud Testing for Affordable Website Reliability

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 15:45:00 EDT

Cloud testing is a new way of establishing reliability, leveraging the Cloud to drive traffic to websites – to measure, analyze and assure performance at web-scale. It gives companies confidence that applications, whether in the Cloud or in a data center, can withstand unexpected surges in traffic. Optimizing responsiveness and the user experience before going into production or when changes occur is critical. Tom Lounibos, Dan Barstow and Mike Kavis know that all the attendees will leave their session with an understanding of cloud testing and how it is used today to ensure website reliability and performance.

Securing Cloud-Based Applications- A Primer for the Uneasy

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 15:00:00 EDT

Cloud computing offers tremendous advantages, providing unparalleled scalability and flexibility to deliver some of business’ most important applications. According to Gene Golovinsky, many businesses are reluctant to adopt cloud-based solutions out of concern for the privacy and security of their data. Unwarranted fear, misguided uncertainty and general uneasiness surround the issue, preventing many organizations from adopting cloud-based solutions. Misconceptions about the inherent security of cloud-based solutions will be explored and methods of overcoming those concerns will be addressed.

Developing Advantage: Platform Leverage in the Cloud

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 13:30:00 EDT

At the Cloud Computing Conference and Expo, Peter Coffee’s session will discuss how cloud computing should not merely relocate the familiar pains, delays, and costs of conventional application development. The cloud already offers developers an expanding field of high-leverage frameworks that measurably improve developer productivity, accelerate deployment and radically reduce project risk.

Virtual Infrastructure: What Is Required for the Cloud?

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 13:00:00 EDT

Too often organizations have deployed virtual infrastructure tactically to reduce server sprawl or speed application deployments. Without a higher level view of organizational priorities, bad habits persist; unused snapshots and zombie VMs become more the rule than the exception causing budgets to continue their upward spiral. As organizations begin to view virtualization strategically and consider its role in cloud infrastructure, it is important to consider the success factors of this foundational element. In his session at Cloud Computing Conference & Expo, Adam Hawley, Director of Product Management for Oracle VM, will examine virtualization considerations such as workload availability, performance, and integration with enterprise systems and resources that are necessary to improve operational efficiency and service delivery.

Hadoop @ Yahoo – Internet Scale Data Processing

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 13:00:00 EDT

Yahoo! is running the largest Hadoop clusters in the world – 25K+ servers, analyzing billions of Web pages, multiple petabytes of storage and billions of records per day. In his session at Cloud Computing Conference & Expo, Eric Baldeschwieler, VP Hadoop Software Development at Yahoo!, will explain what the distribution is, why Yahoo! is sharing its investment in testing Hadoop and how it benefits the larger cloud ecosystem.

Business Acceleration with the Cloud

Mon, 26 Oct 2009 12:45:00 EDT

Has there ever been a more exciting time to be a small software vendor? Or a larger market opportunity for service providers? Or greater flexibility for customers? Cloud is more than a shift in technology architecture; it's a shift in the full business lifecycle of technology providers and consumers. In his session at Cloud Computing Conference & Expo, Chris Arangio, Product Manager in the Cloud Infrastructure Group at EMC, will discuss the impact of the cloud including the challenges and opportunities for service providers, technology implementers, ISVs and their customers. It will highlight the importance of an ecosystem as a critical enabler and long term business opportunity, and describe key considerations for cloud service consumers and other participants in this ecosystem when developing a cloud strategy.

Ulitzer Provides a Powerful Social Journalism Platform

Sun, 25 Oct 2009 08:45:00 EDT

Ulitzer provides a powerful social journalism platform for content syndication, bridging the gap between traditional and new media. For rapid awareness of news, articles, blogs and other content, Ulitzer's keyword tagging enhances searchability and allows targeted audiences to easily find the information they seek. The value of this is magnified with viral syndication on both the Ulitzer network and popular search engines such as Google, Yahoo and Bing, making Ulitzer one of the more effective content publishing sites on the Internet.

Introducing Kindle for PC

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 18:15:00 EDT

Kindle for PC features Amazon’s Whispersync technology that automatically saves and synchronizes bookmarks and last page read across devices. Whether you read Kindle books on a Kindle, Kindle DX, or one of the free Kindle applications, you can always have your reading with you and never lose your place. With Kindle for PC, you can read some on your PC, read some on your Kindle, and always pick up right where you left off. Whispersync helped make the Kindle for iPhone application the most popular books app in the Apple App Store.

MapKit Best Practices

Thu, 22 Oct 2009 15:45:00 EDT

According to Ernest Svehla, “I will include a quick review of key components then present best practices for displaying map customizations and annotations specific to your application needs.” Svehla will be presenting a 45-minute breakout session at iPhone Developer Summit 2009 West, being held November 3rd, 2009, at the Santa Clara Convention Center in conjunction with SYS-CON's 4th International Cloud Computing Expo (November 2-4, 2009).

Here's why Apple is doing so well -- it's the top half, stupid

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 12:14:00 EDT

When failure is not an option, you have to have the best tools, especially when the going gets tough. The sad part is that Apple does so well when so many are not.

Embed iPhone and iPod Touch Applications In Your WordPress Blog

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 10:00:00 EDT

As PcMagazine put it, “uQuery is to the App Store what Google is to the Web”. After allowing people to create an account and mark the applications they like or they own, today, even more good news: uQuery, just released a WordPress plugin allowing you to easily display an iPhone/iPod Touch application details in your blog. [...] Related posts:

A Search Engine for the iPhone AppStore With over 70 thousand new applications for the iPhone &...
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Risks and Enterprise Mobility?

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 08:00:00 EDT

This is the fourth in a series of five initial articles, in which I'm going to put my thoughts and findings on the subject of Enteprise Mobility. For this penultimate article I've decided to raise the Risks to be aware of before and during implementation of an Enterprise Mobility Strategy.

Artisan Pulls Plug on Digital Signage Content Group

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 09:30:00 EDT

Toronto-based point of purchase printing specialist Artisan Complete, which for the last few years has been building a business and reputation as one of the leaders in content strategy and production for digital signage, has pulled the plug on its Artisan Live group.

Mike Brown had been leading the group and left recently, and then on Thursday the well-known face of the Live group, Stephen Ghigliotty and creative director Kris Steeves were shown the door. The group had at least a half-dozen people in it going back two or three years, and had won awards and a lot of recognition for its work.

Both Stephen and Kris are great, talented guys and will be good picks for anyone who wants to grab them, Stephen on strategy and Kris on creative.

It's too bad, as good, innovative work was getting done. But this has been a tough year for the printing industry and the people hooked in to it. The other big content shop based in Toronto, Alchemy, has been very quiet the last few months, as well, but I know it is still active. Alchemy's Dave Dolejsi, one of their key guys, had a cryptic Twitter note up on Thursday about a big account win of some sort.

I don't know if it is just me, but it strikes me as a few companies that manged to wobble their way through the worst of the recession are starting to run on fumes, and being forced to make some hard choices. Maybe the worst of the recession is ending, but I think we will continue to see more right-sizing and exits from the sector.

This is how you find Stephen (and he can get you on to Kris, I'd imagine):

iPhone 647.680.8512

stephen.ghigliotty at gmail.com

Twitter @ghigliotty

Kris Matheson, the other Artisan guy well known for his involvement in the sector, is still around but has been involved in non-DS stuff with the company for quite a while now.

Opportunities and Enterprise Mobility?

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 06:30:00 EDT

This is the third in a series of five initial articles, in which I'm going to put my thoughts and findings on the subject of Enterprise Mobility. For this article I've decided to discuss the Opportunities that lie in front of companies that undertake an Enterprise Mobility Strategy.

How's Business Viewing Enterprise Mobility?

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 10:00:00 EDT

This is the second in a series of five initial articles, in which I'm going to put my thoughts and findings on the subject of Enteprise Mobility. For this article I've decided to tackle the way that Business is now viewing Mobility. This has definately changed over the last few years and has been caused by various factors.

AT&T Delivers a Wireless College Experience

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:15:00 EDT

Built with Application Studio, a mobile application platform from Pyxis Mobile, UpperClass from AT&T is a customizable application delivering a wide range of campus-related information to students, administrators, faculty, parents and alumni. The application provides a college community with real-time access to the information they need, virtually wherever they happen to be, including class information, student and faculty directories, scheduling, administration and community information, social networking, ticket purchasing and fundraising options, along with campus wide alerts such as weather conditions or class cancellations.

Remember the Bruce Springsteen song “Glory Days”?

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 13:00:00 EDT

My favorite blogger, Bob Lefsetz, writes about the entertainment industry, and he had a great line in a post yesterday: “The glory days of the music business are history. They’ll only return when the glory days of music come back.” He’s writing about music — but he’s right about everything. The glory days of the car business will return when we have American companies producing more glorious cars that customers REALLY want. Whatever your business, you can have glory days in your industry when you create and deliver something really remarkable for customers. The economic rising tide we experienced a few years back lifted all boats. Which, of course, means that mediocre players were also doing very well. However, when the recession hit us in the face, it appeared that the “glory days” were done. And, they were…for those of moderate performance.

Building iPhone Apps for Business

Tue, 13 Oct 2009 20:41:00 EDT

Friday I’m speaking at the Mobile 2.0 conference in Mountain View. The topic is “iPhone for Business”, which, if I took the topic literally, raises many issues about distribution and maintenance of smartphones in the enterprise. But I’m really just going to focus on the narrower issue of “iPhone apps for business”: how do you [...]

Social Media Chatter for Entertainment Industry

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 14:00:00 EDT

There are millions of opinions about entertainment being expressed on Facebook, Twitter, blogs, message boards and other social networks. Fizziolo.gy turns these individual opinions into trackable, scored data. Mentions are measured by volume and analyzed to determine sentiment by trained social media analysts. Fizziolo.gy uses people rather than automated keywords because social chatter -- especially in regard to entertainment -- can be impossible for computers to interpret (for example, "That was a SICK movie!" can be positive or negative based on context). The Fizziolo.gy combination of volume and sentiment creates a unique scoring system for entertainment properties to be compared, ranked and tracked over time.

First Open Source 4G Mobile Cloud Platform

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 12:15:00 EDT

Funambol introduced the world's first open source 4G (fourth-generation) mobile cloud platform for device management and synchronization. The platform enables management of mobile devices, and synchronization of diverse mobile media, over WiMax and LTE with social networks, email systems and PCs. The company's software leverages the prevailing Open Mobile Alliance (OMA) standards for device management (DM) and data synchronization (DS). Funambol is working with some of the largest companies in the industry to deploy innovative 4G mobile cloud sync services over the coming months.

Are You Comfortable with Where Your Data Sleeps at Night?

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 06:30:00 EDT

How can you manage the cloud so you – and your data – sleep safe and secure? In a Live Webcast and Interview from Times Square today October 8, Sam Gross, vice president, Global Information Technology Outsourcing Solutions, Unisys Corporation, will answer these questions and more. SYS-CON.TV viewers will have the opportunity to interact directly with Gross, who will be in the SYS-CON.TV studio with Cloud Computing Expo conference chair Jeremy Geelan.

The Open Source Infrastructure for Cloud Computing

Sat, 03 Oct 2009 18:15:00 EDT

The goal of Eucalyptus is to allow sites with existing clusters and server infrastructure to host an elastic computing service that is interface-compatible with Amazon's AWS, but can also support multiple interfaces such as Google's AppEngine and the Sun Cloud open API. Rich Wolski, Chief Technology Officer and Co-founder of Eucalyptus Systems, will discuss this and more in a breakout session to be given at SYS-CON's 1st Annual Government IT Conference & Expo (GovITExpo).

Recursion To Announce the First Real Cross-Platform C++ Toolkit

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 09:30:00 EDT

Recursion Software is about to say that it’s ported its high-performance C++ Toolkit to five of the most popular mobile operating systems so programmers can finally write a single app that can run on any phone using those systems with virtually no modifications. The Symbian release is available now, with iPhone, Android, Windows and Linux support planned for release this winter.

MC Hammer and Cash4Gold Provide Emergency Aid Following Series of Devastating Natural Disasters

Fri, 02 Oct 2009 06:30:00 EDT

"I am asking my followers on Twitter to also follow my example and to do their part to help out those involved in these tragedies," said MC Hammer (http://twitter.com/MCHammer). "Thousands of people here at home and abroad are facing a very difficult time, which is why I'm urging everyone to support Feed The Children, a tremendous organization helping to get these victims back on their feet." MC Hammer has a long-standing relationship and history of charitable work with Feed The Children. At a recent event sponsored by Cash4Gold, he and Cash4Gold CEO Jeff Aronson helped the organization hand out meals to families hard hit by the recession in the Stockton, CA area.