Peter Coffee

Two potentially fatal errors threaten any attempt to introduce portfolio management into an enterprise IT environment. The first is the distortion that results from imposing a single framework for the description, definition and analysis of all IT efforts, even though some of that work is utterly routine while other efforts are wildly speculative. The second […]

eWEEK Labs normally resists the idea of letting a software environment take over our operation, but our visceral reaction to Changepoint 8.0 is that we wish we had something like it. During tests, we accumulated more than 20 screen shots that represented effective and often innovative ways of giving an organization better visibility into where […]

The task of it project planning and portfolio management depends on financially sophisticated assumptions and calculations, and benefits from experience in thinking about how to structure and present comparisons and conclusions. That sophistication and experience are clearly reflected in the design and function of the ValueIT Version 3.21 suite from Alinean LLC. Merely by looking […]

The job of information technology is to inform. This means that IT professionals must be involved in the debate over how IT tools shape the presentation of data and steer decision-making processes. The coming years IT budgets are sure to see proposals for the cinematic video and other multimedia technologies that were prominent on the […]

Like the stars of the night sky, project spending stands out in the enterprise technology budget: Both are obvious targets for observation and analysis but represent only the smallest and most obvious fraction of whats happening out there. Maintenance, upgrades and other efforts are the “dark matter” of the IT universe—difficult to measure but powerfully […]

When off-the-shelf Mac G5s are assembled into the worlds third-fastest computer, as Virginia Techs Terascale Cluster is currently ranked, its clear that once-exotic levels of supercomputing power are available to anyone who wants them. Whats more, that so-called Big Mac 2,200-processor system, which took six months to build at a cost of only about $5 […]

Sun Microsystems Inc. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc., have had their challenges over the past couple of years, but last week the heads of each Silicon Valley stalwart announced news that could lead to brighter days. Sun, of Santa Clara, Calif., unveiled a major customer win with China, along with innovative new technologies, and AMD, […]

The worst thing that could happen to Web services technology is that it becomes defined by a single vendor. Enterprises that want to retain platform choice must demonstrate a preference for multivendor standards, such as the Basic Profile definition of service interoperability that was put forth by the Web Services Interoperability Organization and that gained […]

With Mondays announcement of the Java Card 2.2.1 specification, Sun Microsystems Inc. demonstrates that the fundamental issues of next-generation IT apply across the entire spectrum of devices—from the largest server farms, to the richest desktop and portable clients, all the way down to the most minimal device that can still carry executable content. No matter […]

LAS VEGAS—Opening a Comdex that badly needed proof of the shows continuing relevance, Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates delivered his traditional Sunday night keynote. /zimages/6/28571.gifClick here for more coverage of Bill Gates Comdex Las Vegas 2003 keynote address. Remembering his first appearance in 1983, Gates declared that the PC industry at that […]