Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: HP.

Barcelona -- Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Barcelona, an interview with Kevin Bury, Vice President and General Manager, and Neil Ashizawa, Manager of Products, both with HP Software as a Service.

We were at Software Universe in early December to explore some major enterprise software and solutions, trends and innovations, making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers. [Disclosure: HP is a sponsor of BriefingsDirect podcasts.]

This discussion, with two executives from HP, focuses on the software as a service (SaaS) market and how it and cloud computing are reshaping the future of IT.

Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions, moderated the discussion just after the roll-out of HP’s big application lifecycle management (ALM) news, the release of ALM 11. [See more on HP's new ALM 11 offerings.]

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Bury_and_Ashizawa_on_HP_SaaS_from_Barcelona.mp3
Category:Enterprise IT -- posted at: 12:24pm EDT

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: HP.

Barcelona -- Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast series coming to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Barcelona.

We were here in early December, 2010 to explore some major enterprise software and solutions, trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers. [See more on HP's new ALM 11 offerings.]

This customer case-study from the conference focuses on Vodafone and how they worked toward improved PC client management and automation of client management. BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions, interviews here two executives from their IT organization, Michael Janssen, the Manager of Deployment Automation with Vodafone , and Michael Schroeder, also Manager of Deployment Automation, both based at Vodafone group in Düsseldorf, Germany.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: HP.


Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: Ipanema Technologies.

Get a free white paper on WAN Governance for Cloud Computing.

Get the free Cloud Networking Report.

The latest BriefingsDirect podcast discussion focuses on the rapidly escalating complexity and consequent need for network management innovation in the age of hybrid computing.

And that's because the emphasis nowadays is on "networks," not "network." Long gone are the days when a common and controlled local area network (LAN) served as the workhorse for critical applications and data delivery.

With the increased interest in cloud, software as a service (SaaS), and mobile computing, applications are jockeying across multiple networks, both in terms of how services are assembled, as well in how users in different environments access and respond to these critical applications.

Indeed, cloud computing forces a collapse in the gaps between the former silos of private, public, and personal networking domains. Since the network management and governance tasks have changed and continue to evolve rapidly, so too must the ways in which solutions and technologies address the tangled networks environment we all now live and work in.

Automated network unification and pervasive wide area networking (WAN) governance are proving essential to ensure quality, scale, and manage security across all forms of today's applications use. Join us as we explore the new and future path to WAN governance and to better understand how Ipanema Technologies is working to help its customers make clear headway, so that the next few years bring about a hybrid cloud computing opportunity and not a hastening downward complexity spiral.

We're here now to discuss the new reality of networks and applications delivery performance with Peter Schmidt, Chief Technology Officer, North America, for Ipanema Technologies, and David White, Vice President of Global Business Development at Ipanema. The panel is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: Ipanema Technologies.


Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Barcelona -- Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Barcelona, an interview with Jonathan Priestley, Director of Marketing for HP Software and Solutions, Europe, Middle-East, and Africa (EMEA).

We were at the conference last week to explore some major enterprise software and solutions, trends and innovations, making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers. [Disclosure: HP is a sponsor of BriefingsDirect podcasts.]

Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions, moderated the recap discussion coming on the heels of the roll-out of HP’s application lifecycle management (ALM) news, the release of ALM 11. [See more on HP's new ALM 11 offerings.]


Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Barcelona -- Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast series coming to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Barcelona.

We're here in the week of November 29, 2010 to explore some major enterprise software and solutions, trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers. [See more on HP's new ALM 11 offerings.]

This customer case-study from the conference focuses on AIG-Chartis insurance and how their business has benefited from ongoing application transformation and modernization projects.

To learn more about AIG-Chartis insurance’s innovative use of IT consolidation and application lifecycle management (ALM) best practices, I interviewed Abe Naguib, Director of Global Performance Architecture and Infrastructure Engineering at AIG-Chartis in Jersey City, NJ.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-AIG-Chartis_Uses_ALM_to_Gain_IT_Productivity.mp3
Category:Enterprise IT -- posted at: 10:47am EDT

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Barcelona -- Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast series coming to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Barcelona.

We're here in the week of November 29, 2010 to explore some major enterprise software and solutions, trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers. [See more on HP's new ALM 11 offerings.]

This customer case-study from the conference focuses on Enel Green Power and how their Italian utility business has benefited from improved management of core business processes and gained visibility into new energy projects, also adhering to compliance through better planning and the ability to scope out new projects comprehensively. [Disclosure: HP is a sponsor of BriefingsDirect podcasts.]

To learn about Enel Green Power’s innovative use of project and portfolio management (PPM), please join Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions, as he interviews Massimo Ferriani, CIO of Enel Green Power in Rome.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. 

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Enel_Green_Power_on_PPM_Benefits.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 8:25am EDT

Barcelona -- Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Barcelona, an interview with Jonathan Rende, Vice President and General Manager for Applications Business at HP Software.

We're here the week of November 29, 2010 to explore some major enterprise software and solutions, trends and innovations, making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers. [Disclosure: HP is a sponsor of BriefingsDirect podcasts.]

Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions, moderated the discussion just after the roll-out of HP’s big application lifecycle management (ALM) news, the release of ALM 11. [See more on HP's new ALM 11 offerings.]

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-HP_Apps_Head_Rende_on_Strategic_Impact_of_ALM.mp3
Category:Enterprise IT -- posted at: 2:28pm EDT

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast series, coming to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Barcelona the week of November 29, 2010. We're here to explore some major enterprise software and solutions, trends and innovations, making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers.

To learn more about HP’s application life-cycle management (ALM) news -- and its customer impact from the conference -- please welcome Mark Sarbiewski, Vice President of Product Marketing for HP applications. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Listen to the podcast. Find it on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Mark_Sarbiewski_on_HP_ALM_11_Uses_and_Benefits.mp3
Category:Enterprise IT -- posted at: 10:56am EDT

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

For more information on Application Lifecycle Management and how to gain an advantage from application modernization, please click here.

The latest BriefingsDirect podcast discussion examines a new book on application lifecycle management (ALM) best practices, one that offers new methods and insights for dramatic business services delivery improvement.

The topic of ALM will be a big one at next week's HP Software Universe conference in Barcelona. In anticipation, join us as we explore application lifecycle management (ALM) best practices for overall business services delivery improvement.

In this discussion, the last in a series of three, we underscore the conclusions from the book and explain how organizations can begin now to change how they deliver and maintain applications in a fast-changing world.

Complexity, silos of technology and culture, and a shifting landscape of application delivery options have all conspired to reduce the effectiveness of traditional applications approaches. In the forthcoming book, called The Applications Handbook: A Guide to Mastering the Modern Application Lifecycle, the authors evaluate the role and impact of automation and management over an application's lifecycle, as well as delve into the need to gain better control over applications through a holistic governance perspective.

In our first podcast, we focused on the role and impact of automation and management of applications, and emphasized the need to gain control over applications through a holistic lifecycle perspective.

The second discussion in the series looked at how an enterprise, Delta Air Lines, moved successfully to improve its applications’ quality, and gain the ability to deliver better business results from those applications.

Finally, we're here now with the book’s authors to explore their conclusions. Please join me in welcoming Mark Sarbiewski, Vice President of Marketing for HP Applications, and Brad Hipps , Senior Manager of Solution Marketing for HP Applications. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

For more information on Application Lifecycle Management and how to gain an advantage from application modernization, please click here.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-How_to_Automate_Application_Lifecycle_Management.mp3
Category:Enterprise IT -- posted at: 11:52am EDT

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

For more information on Application Lifecycle Management and how to gain an advantage from application modernization, please click here.

The latest BriefingsDirect podcast discussion examines a new book on application lifecycle management (ALM) best practices, one that offers new methods and insights for dramatic business services delivery improvement.

The topic of ALM will be a big one at next week's HP Software Universe conference in Barcelona. In anticipation, join us as we explore a new book on application lifecycle management (ALM) best practices, one that offers some new methods for overall business services delivery improvement.

Complexity, silos of technology and culture, and a shifting landscape of application delivery options have all conspired to reduce the effectiveness of traditional applications approaches. In the forthcoming book, called The Applications Handbook: A Guide to Mastering the Modern Application Lifecycle, the authors evaluate the role and impact of automation and management over an application's lifecycle, as well as delve into the need to gain better control over applications through a holistic governance perspective to help head-off poor applications productivity.

This is the second (read more about and access the first podcast) in the series of three podcasts on the "Application Lifecycle Management" book. We're here with the authors, but we are also here to learn about how one enterprise, Delta Air Lines, has moved successfully to improve its applications’ quality and impact and to better deliver real business results from those applications.

So please join me now welcoming our panel, David Moses, Quality Assurance Manager for Delta’s eCommerce IT Group, and John Bell, Senior Test Engineer in the eCommerce IT Group at Delta; book c0-author Mark Sarbiewski, Vice President of marketing for HP Applications, and c0-author Brad Hipps, Senior Manager for Solution Marketing at HP Applications. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

For more information on Application Lifecycle Management and how to gain an advantage from application modernization, please click here.

Listen to the podcast. Find it on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.


Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

The latest BriefingsDirect podcast discussion examines a new book on application lifecycle management (ALM) best practices, one that offers some new methods and insights for overall business services delivery improvement. The topic of ALM will be a big one at next week's HP Software Universe conference in Barcelona.

In anticipation, join us as we explore the current state of applications in large organizations, and how complexity, silos of technology and culture, and a shifting landscape of application delivery options, have all conspired to reduce the effectiveness of traditional applications approaches.

In the forthcoming book, called The Applications Handbook: A Guide to Mastering the Modern Application Lifecycle, the authors pursue the role and impact of automation and management over applications, as well as delving into the need to gain control over applications through a holistic lifecycle perspective.

This is the first, in a series of three podcasts, on the ALM book, and we're here now with the authors to learn, first and foremost, why they wrote it, and to explore their major findings: Mark Sarbiewski, Vice President of Marketing for HP Applications, and Brad Hipps, Senior Manager of Solution Marketing for HP Applications. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

For more information on Application Lifecycle Management and how to gain an advantage from application modernization, please click here.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.


Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: HP.

Three megatrends are shaping the next generation of successful businesses and governments. We're talking about pervasive mobile applications, highly responsive cloud-computing models, and knowledge-adept social collaboration.

Indeed, by the year 2020, The Economist newspaper predicts there will be two trillion devices connected to the Internet. And taking a look at where we are right now, McKinsey Quarterly reported in August that in 2010 some four billion people have cell phones, and 450 million have access to a full web experience.

Moreover, Jupiter Research reports that by 2014 there will be 130 million enterprise users involved with mobile cloud activities. Not only is access pervasive, but the amount of information available is also exploding. The Economist again reports that in 2005 mankind created 150 exabytes of digital data … and in 2010 we will create fully eight times more data.

As these trends literally rearrange business ecosystems, a gap will surely emerge between the companies that master change -- and exploit enabling technologies -- and those that fall ever further behind.

For those that do step up to the challenge -- expect a relentless emphasis on rapidly recurring innovation to meet dynamic customer and citizen demands.

Our latest BriefingsDirect podcast therefore focuses on how these trends -- and rapidly evolving customer, citizen, and user expectations -- are newly impacting the enterprise. We also examine how technology advancements are making it possible to drive innovation to meet these new demands for instant gratification.

Please join HP executive Dave Shirk, Senior Vice President of Worldwide Marketing at HP Enterprise Business, as we explore how HP is working to make headway, so that the next few years bring about a generational opportunity -- and not a downward complexity spiral. The discussion here is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: HP.


Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: Genuitec. Learn more.

The rapidly changing and fast-growing opportunity for more businesses to reach their customers and deliver their services via mobile applications is at a crossroads.

Over just the past two years, the demand for mobile applications on more capable classes of devices, such as smartphones and tablets, has skyrocketed. Now businesses need to figure out how they can get into the action.

Small and medium-size businesses (SMBs) especially need to reevaluate their application development and end-user access strategies to be able to deliver low-cost yet impactful applications to these newer devices. This goes for reaching employees, as well as partners, users, and customers.

Hopefully, there's a shift in the skills required to put these applications on these devices and distribute them. The emphasis on capabilities is moving from hardcore coders -- with mastery of embedded platforms and tools -- to more mainstream graphical and scripting-skilled workers, more power-users than developers.

This sponsored podcast explores how mobile application development and the market opportunity are shifting, and how more businesses can quickly get into the mobile applications game and build out new revenue, share more data, and provide better direct customer access in the process.

Our panel consists of Roger Entner, Senior Vice President and Head of Research and Insights in the Telecom Practice at the Nielsen Co., and Wayne Parrott, Vice President for Product Development at Genuitec. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: Genuitec. Learn more.


How do IT architectures at software-as-a-service (SaaS) providers provide significant advantages over traditional enterprise IT architectures?

We answer that "Architecture is Destiny" question by looking at how one SaaS provider, Workday, has from the very beginning moved beyond relational databases and distributed architectures that date to the mid-1990s.

Instead, Workday has designed its architecture to provide secure transactions, wider integrations, and deep analysis off of the same optimized data source -- all to better serve business needs. The advantages of these modern services-based architecture can be passed on to the end users -- and across the ecosystem of business process partners -- at significantly lower cost than conventional IT.

Join a technology executive from Workday, Petros Dermetzis, Vice President of Development there, to explore how architecting properly provides the means to adapt and extend how businesses need to operate, and not be limited by how IT has to operate. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

 

Additional resources:

The Real SaaS Manifesto (whitepaper)
Things Large Enterprises Need to Know About SaaS
Strength from the Core: Why Bolted-On BI Doesn't Work for HR
Built-In Business Intelligence
Real Saas
Notes from Workday's Technology Summit

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: Workday.

 

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Architecture_is_Destiny_at_Workday.mp3
Category:B2B Informational Podcast -- posted at: 3:21pm EDT

Businesses are increasingly using cloud and e-commerce to improve how they do sales, marketing, and online transactions.

One company, Tampa-based MarkMaster, has quickly moved to nearly all-paperless sales transactions, found new customers via online networks, and increased the amount of product it sells to its existing clients. This was accomplished without a lot of additional IT or business-process spending by using cloud-based collaborative business commerce solutions.

To learn more about how MarkMaster is conducting its business better, BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions, recently interviewed Kevin Govin, the CEO at MarkMaster.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: Ariba.


Businesses are looking to cloud-computing models to foster agility and improve time-to-market for new services. Yet attaining cloud benefits can founder without higher levels of unified server, data, network, storage, and applications management.

These typically disparate forms of management must now come together in new ways to mutually support a variety of different cloud approaches -- public, private, and hybrid. Without adoption of such Business Service Automation (BSA) capabilities, those deploying applications on private and hybrid clouds will almost certainly encounter increased complexity, higher risk, and stubborn cost structures.

This discussion therefore focuses on finding low-risk, high-reward paths to cloud computing by using increased automation and proven reference models for cloud management -- and by breaking down traditional IT management silos. In doing so, the progression toward cloud benefits will come more quickly, at lower total cost, and with an ability to rapidly scale to even more applications and data.

We're here with two executives from HP Software & Solutions to learn more about what BSA is and why it's proving essential to managed and productive cloud computing adoption: Mark Shoemaker, Executive Program Manager for Cloud Computing in the Software & Solutions Group at HP, and Venkat Devraj, Chief Technology Officer for Application Automation, also in HP’s Software & Solutions Group. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Also find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Business_Service_Automation_Aids_Cloud_Deployments.mp3
Category:general -- posted at: 3:29pm EDT

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: FuseSource.

The FUSE family of software is now under the FuseSource name and has gained new autonomy from Progress Software with its own corporate identity.

Part of the IONA Technologies acquisition by Progress Software in 2008, FuseSource has now become its own company, owned by Progress, but now more independent, to aggressively pursue its open source business model and to leverage the community development process strengths.

Our discussion here targets the rapid growth, increased relevance, and new market direction for major open source middleware and integration software under the Apache license.

We'll also look at where FuseSource projects are headed in the near future. [NOTE: Larry Alston also recently joined FuseSource as president.]

Even as the IT mega vendors are consolidating more elements of IT infrastructure, and in some cases, buying up open-source projects and companies, the role and power of open source for enterprise and service providers alike has never been more popular or successful. Virtualization, cloud computing, mobile computing, and services orientation are all supporting more interest and increased mainstream use of open-source infrastructure.

Here now to discuss how FuseSource is therefore evolving we're joined by Debbie Moynihan, Director of Marketing for FuseSource, and Rob Davies, Director of Engineering for FuseSource. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's  Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: FuseSource.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-FuseSource_Re-Energizes_for_OSS_Middleware_Push.mp3
Category:Enterprise IT -- posted at: 10:45am EDT

Management and governance are the arbiters of success or failure when we look across a cloud services ecosystem and the full lifecycle of those applications. That's why governance is so important in the budding era of cloud computing.

As cloud-delivered services become the coin of the productivity realm, how those services are managed as they are developed, deployed, and used -- across a services lifecycle -- increasingly determines their true value.
And yet governance is still too often fractured, poorly extended across the development-and-deployment continuum, and often not able to satisfy the new complexity inherent in cloud models.

One key bellwether for future service environments and for defining the role and requirements for cloud governance is
in applications development, which due to the popularity of platform as a service (PaaS) is already largely a services ecosystem.

Here to help us explain why visibility across services creation and deployment is essential -- and how governance can be effectively baked into complex ecosystems -- we're joined by Jeff Papows, President and CEO of WebLayers and the author of Glitch: The Hidden Impact of Faulty Software, and John McDonald, CEO of CloudOne Corp. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a transcript or download a copy. Get a copy of Glitch: The Hidden Impact of Faulty Software. Learn more about governance risks. Sponsor: WebLayers.  


An often-overlooked aspect of data center transformation (DCT) is what to do with the older assets inside of data centers as newer systems come online. Improperly disposing of data and other IT assets can cause great disruption and an increase in costs, if not liability and risk of regulatory penalties.

Indeed, many IT organizations are largely unaware of the security and privacy risks of the systems that they need to find a new home for and can often find themselves delivered to the wrong hands. So thinking through the retirement of older assets should be considered early in any DCT process.

Compliance and recycling issues, as well as data security concerns and proper software disposition should therefore be top of mind. DCT is a journey, and an essential part of that process is modernizing, but at the same time sun-setting older systems must come with data protection in mind, and even with an eye to monetize those older systems -- or at least recycle them properly.

In this podcast, we examine how HP manages productive transitions of data center assets -- from security and environmental impact, to recycling and resale, and even to rental of new and older systems during a DCT process. With to explain how to best take care of the older systems reducing risk, as well as providing a financial return, are Helen Tang, Worldwide Data Center Transformation Lead for HP Enterprise Business, and Jim O'Grady, Director of Global Life Cycle Asset Management Services with HP Financial Services. Welcome to the show. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.


We've all heard a lot about client virtualization or virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) over the past few years, and there are some really great technologies for delivering a PC client experience as a service.

But today’s business and economic drivers need to go beyond just good technology. There also needs to be a clear rationale for change -- both business and economic. Second, there needs to be proven methods for properly moving to client virtualization at low risk and in ways that lead to both high productivity and lower total costs over time.

Cloud computing, mobile device proliferation, and highly efficient data centers are all aligning to make it clear that the deeper and flexible client support from back-end servers will become more the norm and less the exception over time.

Client devices and application types will also be dynamically shifting both in numbers and types, and crossing the chasm between the consumer and business spaces. The new requirements for businesses point to the need for planning and proper support of infrastructures that can accommodate these clients, and to do so with an attractive long-term price-point.

So we're here to discuss how client virtualization infrastructure works, where it fits in to support multiple future client directions, and why it makes a tremendous amount of sense economically. To learn more about client virtualization strategies and best practices, we're joined by Dan Nordhues, Marketing and Business Manager for Client Virtualization Solutions in HP's Industry Standard Servers Organization. The interview is conducted by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Client_Virtualization_Strategies_With_HP.mp3
Category:Enterprise IT -- posted at: 4:31pm EDT

The trap of unchecked virtualization complexity can have a stifling effect on the advantageous spread of virtualization in data centers.

Indeed, many enterprises may think they have already exhausted their virtualization paybacks, when in fact, they have only scratched the surface of the potential long-term benefits.

Automation, policy-driven processes and best practices are offering more opportunities for optimizing virtualization so that server, storage, and network virtualization can move from points of progress into more holistic levels of adoption.

The goals then are data center transformation, performance and workload agility, and cost and energy efficiency. Many data centers are leveraging automation and best practices to attain 70 percent and even 80 percent adoption rates.

By taking such a strategic outlook on virtualization, process automation sets up companies to better exploit cloud computing and IT transformation benefits at the pace of their choosing, not based on artificial limits imposed by dated or manual management practices.

To explore how automation can help achieve strategic levels of virtualization, BriefingsDirect brought together panelists Erik Frieberg, Vice President of Solutions Marketing at HP Software, and Erik Vogel, Practice Principal and America's Lead for Cloud Resources at HP. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.


As data center planners seek to improve performance and future-proof their investments, the networking leg on the infrastructure stool can no longer stand apart. Advances such as widespread virtualization, increased modularity, converged infrastructure, and cloud computing are all forcing a rethinking of data center design.

And so the old rules of networking need to change because specialized, labor-intensive and homogeneous networking systems need to be be brought into the total modern data center architecture. The increasingly essential role of networking in data center transformation (DCT) needs to stop being a speed bump and instead cut complexity while spurring on adaptability and flexibility.

Networking must be better architected within -- and not bolted onto -- the DCT future. The networking-inclusive total architecture needs to accomplish the total usage pattern and requirements for both today and tomorrow -- and with an emphasis on openness, security, flexibility, and sustainability.

To learn more about how networking is changing, and how organizations can better architect networking into their data centers future, BriefingsDirect assembled two executives from HP, Helen Tang, Worldwide Data Center Transformation Solutions Lead, and Jay Mellman, Senior Director of Product Marketing in the HP Networking Unit.  The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Special Offer: Gain insight into best practices for transforming your data center by downloading three whitepapers from HP at www.hp.com/go/dctpodcastwhitepapers.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.


As enterprises examine the use of cloud computing for core IT functions, how can they protect themselves against service provider lock-in, ensure openness and portability of applications and data, and foster a true marketplace among cloud providers?

Indeed, this burning question about the value and utility of cloud computing centers on whether applications and data can move with relative ease from cloud to cloud -- that is, across so-called public- and private-cloud divides, and among and between various public cloud providers.

Get the free
"Cloud Lock-In Prevention Checklist"
here.

For enterprises to determine the true value of cloud models -- and to ascertain if their cost and productivity improvements will be sufficient to overcome the disruptive shift to cloud computing -- they really must know the actual degree of what I call "application fungibility."

Fungible means being able to move in and out of like systems or processes. But what of modern IT applications? Fungible applications could avoid the prospect of swapping on-premises platform lock-in for some sort of cloud-based service provider lock-in and, perhaps over time, prevent being held hostage to arbitrary and rising cloud prices.

Application fungibility would, I believe, create a real marketplace for cloud services, something very much in the best interest of enterprises, small and medium businesses (SMBs), independent software vendors (ISVs), and developers.

In this latest BriefingsDirect podcast discussion, we examine how enterprises and developers should be considering the concept of application fungibility, both in terms of technical enablers and standards for cloud computing, and also consider how to craft the proper service-level agreements (SLAs) to promote fungibility of their applications.

Here to explore how application fungibility can bring efficiency and ensure freedom of successful cloud computing, we're joined by Paul Fremantle, Chief Technology Officer and Co-Founder at WSO2, and Miko Matsumura, author of SOA Adoption for Dummies and an influential blogger and thought leader on cloud computing subjects. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: WSO2.

 

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Why_Cloud_Services_Need_to_Be_Open_Fungible.mp3
Category:Enterprise IT -- posted at: 11:50am EDT

We've assembled a panel to examine the business impact of cloud computing, to explore practical implementations of cloud models, and to move beyond the hype and into gaining business paybacks from successful cloud adoption.

Coming to you from The Open Group’s Cloud Practitioners Conference in Boston on July 21, the panel tackles such issues as what stands in the way of cloud use, safe and low-risk cloud computing, and working around inhibitors to cloud use. We also delve into a compelling example of successful cloud practices at the Harvard Medical School.

Learn more about cloud best practices and produced practical business improvements from guests Pam Isom, Senior Certified Executive IT Architect at IBM; Mark Skilton, Global Director, Applications Outsourcing at Capgemini; Dr. Marcos Athanasoulis, Director of Research Information Technology for Harvard Medical School, and Henry Peyret, Principal Analyst at Forrester Research. The panel is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.


Coming to you from The Open Group’s Enterprise Architecture Practitioners Conference in Boston on July 21, we've assembled a panel to explore a new milit

ary aircraft systems interoperability consortium and effort, the Future Airborne Capability Environment (FACE).

FACE aims to promote and better support interoperability and standardization among future military avionics platforms acrossseveral branches of the U.S. Armed Forces. We define FACE, how it came about, and examine the consortium's basic goals under the tutelage of The Open Group.
Here to help better understand the promise and potential for FACE to improve costs, spur upgrades, flexibility, and accelerate the avionics 

components' development agility is our panel, David Lounsbury, Vice President for Collaboration Services at The Open Group, and Mike Williamson, Deputy Program Mana

ger for Mission Systems with the Navy's Air Combat Electronics Program Office. The conversation is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.


As more services, applications, and data are developed for -- and delivered via -- cloud models, how do business to business (B2B) commerce and procurement adapt?

Or, perhaps we have the cart in front of the horse. Are the new requirements and expectations of modern, global business processes, in fact, driving the demand for IT solutions that can be best delivered via cloud models?

Either way, the promise of cloud aligns very well with the sophistication of modern B2B ecommerce and the pressing need for speed, agility, discovery, efficiency, and adaptability. Ecosystems of services are swiftly organizing around cloud models. How then should businesses best respond?

To answer these questions, BriefingsDirect assembled a group of IT industry analysts and executives at the recent Ariba LIVE 2010 conference in Orlando, Fla. to explore the business implications for ecommerce in the cloud-computing era.

Panelists include Robert Mahowald, Research Vice President at IDC; Mickey North Rizza, Research Director at AMR Research, a Gartner company; Tim Minahan, Chief Marketing Officer at Ariba, and Chris Sawchuk, Managing Director at The Hackett Group. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: Ariba.


We've assembled a panel to examine the key market trends impacting enterprise architecture (EA) in different regions of the world. We'll evaluate how the use and value of EA is emerging and progressing worldwide, and how the expanding use of EA offers a unique window into global business trends as well.

Coming to you from last week's The Open Group’s Enterprise Architecture Practitioners Conference in Boston, the experts here share their knowledge on several developing and mature markets, as well as present a focus on China. We'll hear about the cultural barriers and/or accelerants for EA adoption from region to region.

Here to help better understand the role of EA as it bestrides the globe, please welcome Allen Brown, President and CEO of The Open Group; Eric Boulay, president and CEO of Arismore and also CEO of The Open Group, France; Chris Forde, vice president of Enterprise Architecture & Membership Capabilities of The Open Group; Mats Gejnevall, a Certified Enterprise Architect with Capgemini, Sweden, and Stuart Macgregor, CEO of Real IRM and CEO of The Open Group, South Africa. The panel is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Global_Trends_in_Enterprise_Architecture.mp3
Category:Enterprise IT -- posted at: 1:25pm EDT

Coming to you from The Open Group’s Security Practitioners Conference in Boston, we’ve assembled a panel this week to delve into the advancing role and powerful potential for enterprise architecture (EA).

The economy’s grip on IT budgets, and the fast changing sourcing models like cloud computing, are pointing to a reckoning for EA -- of now defining a vast new promise for IT business alignment improvement or, conversely, a potentially costly lost opportunity.

The need for EA seems to be more pressing than ever, yet efforts to professionalize EA do not necessarily lead to increased credibility and adoption, at least not yet.

We’ll examine the shift of IT from mysterious art to more engineered science and how enterprise architects face the unique opportunity to usher in the concept of business architecture and increased business agility.

Here to help us better understanding the dynamic role of EA, we're joined by Jeanne Ross, Director and Principal Research Scientist at the MIT Center for Information Systems Research and noted author; Dave Hornford, an architecture practice principal at Integritas Solutions, as well as the Chairman of The Open Group Architecture Forum, and Len Fehskens, Vice President for Skills and Capabilities at The Open Group. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podscast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.


Welcome to panel discussion that examines the need for improved common defenses -- including advancing cooperation between enterprise architects and chief security officers -- to jointly defend against burgeoning cyber security threats. The risks are coming from inside enterprises, as well as myriad external sources.

From the panel, at The Open Group’s Security Practitioners Conference this week in Boston, we’ll learn more about the nature of these borderless, external, cyber security threats, as they emerge from criminal enterprises, globally competitive business sources, even state-based threats, and sometimes a combination of these. We’ll also hear recommendations on developing smarter processes for cyber security based on proven methods and pervasive policies.

To help broaden the scope of enterprise architecture, and to develop a leverage point for "mission architecture"-levels of security and defenses, we're joined by retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Harry D. Raduege Jr., chairman of the Deloitte Center for Cyber Innovation, and who co-chairs a cybersecurity commission under President Obama; Jim Hietala, Vice President of Security at the Open Group, and Usman Sindhu, researcher at Forrester Research. The panel is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.


Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast coming to you from the Ariba LIVE 2010 Conference in Orlando.

This podcast is a presentation of a May 25 stage-based panel event on the implications of cloud computing for procurement, supply-chain management, and a host of other business functions. For those of you unable to attend the actual conference, please now listen to this lively and informative panel by a group of noted industry analysts.

Here is the moderator of our discussion, Tim Minahan, Chief Marketing Officer at Ariba.

Minahan: When discussing heady topics like the cloud, procurement, and finance, and looking at the future of business-to-business (B2B) commerce, we thought it important for you to hear from the experts. So we have assembled a panel of the leading analysts -- the folks that you turn to to benchmark your performance, uncover best practices, and make IT buying decisions.

I'd like to welcome our panelists: Mickey North Rizza from AMR Research (a Gartner company), Chris Sawchuk from The Hackett Group, Robert Mahowald from IDC, and Bruce Guptill from Saugatuck Technology.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: Ariba.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Analyst_Define_Cloud_Commerce_Value_at_Ariba_Event.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 10:02am EDT

Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast, a event recap interview with  Anton Knolmar, Vice President of Marketing for HP Software & Solutions, conducted by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

The one-on-one discussion comes to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Washington D.C. We're here the week of June 14, 2010, to explore some major enterprise software and solutions trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Live_From_HP_SWU-Anton_Knolmar_Wraps_Up_Banner_Event.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 10:41am EDT

Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast, an interview with Anand Eswaran, Vice President of Professional Services for HP Software & Solutions, conducted by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

The one-on-one discussion comes to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Washington D.C. We're here the week of June 14, 2010, to explore some major enterprise software and solutions trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers.

At Software Universe HP announced the launch of a new portfolio element called Solution Management Services (SMS). It offers the ability to support the entire solution for the customer, which is different from the past, where software companies could only support the product. That’s the heart of what SMS means. It’s the first step in a very large industry transformation.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.


Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast series, coming to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Washington, D.C. We're here the week of June 14, 2010, to explore some major enterprise software and solutions trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers.

Our next customer case study focuses on Motorola in the area of productivity, cost optimization, and their IT efficiency efforts -- a winner of HP's Excellence Award this year.

We're going to hear more about that from Judy Murrah, Senior Director of IT, at Motorola. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Live_From_HP_SWU-Motorola_Cuts_IT_Costs_With_PPM.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 10:10am EDT

Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast, an interview with Bill Veghte, Executive Vice President of the HP Software & Solutions group, conducted by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.
The one-on-one discussion comes to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Washington D.C. We're here the week of June 14, 2010, to explore some major enterprise software and solutions trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers.

Find the podcasts on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Live_From_HP_SWU-Interview_with_Bill_Veghte.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 4:00pm EDT

Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast, an interview with Robin Purohit, Vice President and General Manager of the Software Products Business Unit for HP Software & Solutions, conducted by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

The one-on-one discussion comes to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Washington D.C. We're here the week of June 14, 2010, to explore some major enterprise software and solutions trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-SWU_Live_2010_With_Robin_Purohit.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 5:30pm EDT

Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast series, coming to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Washington D.C. We're here the week of June 14, 2010, to explore some major enterprise software and solutions trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers.

We're now joined by Anton Knolmar, Vice President of Marketing for HP Software & Solutions. The interview is conducted by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-SWU_Live_2010_With_Anton_Knolmar.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 4:07pm EDT

Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast series coming to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Washington, DC. We're here the week of June 14, 2010 to explore some major enterprise software and solutions trends and innovations making news across HP's ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers.

Our topic for this conversation focuses on the challenges and progress in conducting massive and comprehensive backups of enterprise live data, applications, and systems. We'll take a look at how HP Data Protector is managing and safeguarding petabytes of storage per week across HP's next-generation data centers.

The case-study sheds light on how enterprises can consolidate their storage and backup efforts to improve response and recovery times ,while also reducing total costs.

To learn more about high-performance enterprise scale storage and reliable backup, please join me in welcoming Lowell Dale, a technical architect in HP's IT organization. The interview is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Live_From_HP_SWU-HP_Data_Protector_Podcast.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 8:03am EDT

Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast series, coming to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Washington, D.C. We're here the week of June 14, 2010, to explore some major enterprise software and solutions trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers.

Our next customer case study focuses on Delta Air Lines and the use of quality assurance tools for requirements management as well as mapping the test cases and moving into full production quickly.

We're joined by David Moses, Manager of Quality Assurance for Delta.com and its self service efforts, and John Bell, a Senior Test Engineer at Delta. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Read a full transcript. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Live_From_HP_SWU-Delta_Air_Lines_on_App_Quality.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 7:08am EDT

Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect podcast series, coming to you from the HP Software Universe 2010 Conference in Washington, D.C. We're here the week of June 14, 2010, to explore some major enterprise software and solutions trends and innovations making news across HP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and developers.

This customer case-study focuses on McKesson Corp., a provider of certified healthcare information technology, including electronic health records, medical billing, and claims management software. McKesson is a user of HP’s project-based performance testing products used to make sure that applications perform in the field as intended throughout their lifecycle.
To learn more about McKesson’s innovative use of quality assurance software, we interview Todd Eaton,Director of Application Lifecycle Management Tools in the CTO’s office at McKesson. The interview is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Find the podcast on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.comRead a full transcript. Sponsor: HP

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Live_From_HP_SWU-McKesson_Case_Study.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 6:16am EDT

Welcome to a sponsored podcast discussion on identifying the top reasons and paybacks for adopting cloud computing.

If cloud, in its many forms, gains traction -- like any other big change affecting business and IT -- adopters require a lot of rationales, incentives, and measurable returns to keep progressing successfully. But, just as the definition of cloud computing itself can elicit myriad responses, the same is true for
why an organization should encourage cloud computing.

The major paybacks are not clearly agreed upon, for sure. Are the paybacks purely in economic terms? Is cloud a route
to IT efficiency primarily? Are the business agility benefits paramount? Or, does cloud transform business and markets in ways not yet fully understood?

We'll seek a list of the top reasons why exploiting cloud computing models make sense, and why at least experimenting with cloud should be done sooner rather than later. We have assembled a panel of cloud experts to put some serious wood behind the arrow leading to the cloud.

Please join me now in welcoming Archie Reed, HP's Chief Technologist for Cloud Security and the author of several publications including The Definitive Guide to Identity Management and a new book, The Concise Guide to Cloud Computing; Jim Reavis, executive director of the Cloud Security Alliance (CSA) and president of Reavis Consulting Group, and Dave Linthicum, Chief Technology Officer of Bick Group and also a prolific cloud blogger and author. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or
download a copy. Sponsor: HP.  

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Top_Reasons_for_Adopting_Cloud_Computing.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 11:35am EDT

The latest BriefingsDirect executive interview centers on gaining visibility and control into the IT services management lifecycle while progressing toward cloud computing. We dig into the Cloud Service Automation (CSA) and lifecycle management market and offerings with Mark Shoemaker, Executive Program Manager, BTO Software for Cloud at HP.

As cloud computing in its many forms gains traction, higher levels of management complexity are inevitable for large enterprises, managed service providers (MSPs), and small-to-medium sized businesses (SMBs). Gaining and keeping control becomes even more critical for all these organizations, as applications are virtualized and as services and data sourcing options proliferate, both inside and outside of enterprise boundaries.

More than just retaining visibility, however, IT departments and business leaders need the means to fine-tune and govern services use, business processes, and the participants accessing them across the entire services ecosystem. The problem is how to move beyond traditional manual management methods, while being inclusive of legacy systems to automate, standardize, and control the way services are used.

We're here with HP's Shoemaker examine an expanding set of CSA products, services, and methods designed to help enterprises exploit cloud and services values, while reducing risks and working toward total management of all systems and services. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: HP.


Today's headlines point to more sophisticated and large-scale and malicious online activities. For some folks, therefore, the consensus seems to be that the cloud computing model and vision are not up to the task when it comes to security.

To view a full video of the panel discussion on cloud-based security, please go to the registration page.

But at the RSA Conference earlier this year, a panel came together to talk about security and cloud computing, to examine the intersection of cloud computing, security, Internet services, and Internet-based security practices to uncover differences between perceptions and reality.

The result is a special sponsored BriefingsDirect podcast and video presentation that takes stock of cloud-focused security not just as a risk, but also as an amelioration of risk across all aspects of IT.

Join panelists Chris Hoff, Director of Cloud and Virtualization Solutions at Cisco SystemsJeremiah Grossman, the founder and Chief Technology Officer at WhiteHat Security, and Andy Ellis, the Chief Security Architect at Akamai Technologies. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, Principal Analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. View the video. Sponsor: Akamai Technologies.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-How_Cloud_Computing_Improves_IT_Security_Practices.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:18pm EDT

Special offer: Download a free, supported 30-day trial of Active Endpoint's ActiveVOS atwww.activevos.com/insight.


The latest BriefingsDirect Analyst Insights Edition, Vol. 52, focuses client-side architectures and the prospect of heightened disruption in the PC and device software arenas.

Such trends as cloud computing, service oriented architecture (SOA), social media, software as a service (SaaS), and virtualization are combining and overlapping to upset the client landscape. If more of what more users are doing with their clients involves services, then shouldn't the client be more services ready? Should we expect one client to do it all very well, or do we need to think more about specialized clients that might be configured on the fly?

Today's clients are more tied to the past than the future, where one size fits all. Most clients consist of a handful of entrenched PC platforms, a handful of established web browsers, and a handful of PC-like smartphones. But, what has become popular on the server, virtualization, is taken to its full potential on these edge devices. New types of dynamic and task specific client types might emerge. We'll take a look at what they might look like.

Also, just as Windows 7 for Microsoft is quickly entering the global PC market, cloud providers are in an increasingly strong position to potentially favor certain client types or data and configuration synchronization approaches. Will the client lead the cloud or vice versa? We'll talk about that too.

Either way, the new emphasis seems to be on full-media, webby activities, where standards and technologies are vying anew for some sort of a de-facto dominance across both rich applications as well as media presentation capabilities.

We look at the future of the client with a panel of analysts and guests: Chad Jones, Vice President for Product Management at Neocleus; Michael Rowley, CTO of Active Endpoints; Jim Kobielus, Senior Analyst at Forrester Research; Michael Dortch, Director of Research at Focus; JP Morgenthal, Chief Architect, Merlin International, and Dave Linthicum, CTO, Bick Group. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Charter Sponsor: Active Endpoints.

Special offer: Download a free, supported 30-day trial of Active Endpoint's ActiveVOSat www.activevos.com/insight.


Our latest BriefingsDirect interview is with an executive from HP to look at proper planning and execution for massive application consolidation projects, specifically by examining an HP project itself.

By unpacking this multi-year application consolidation project across global supply chains, we learn about best practices and execution accelerators for such projects, which often involve hundreds of applications and impact thousands of people.

These are by no means trivial projects, and often involve every aspect of IT, as well as require a backing of the business leadership and the users to be done well. The goal through these complex undertakings is to radically improve how applications are developed, managed, and governed across their lifecycle to better support dynamic business environments. The stakes, therefore, are potentially huge for both IT and the business.

The telling case-study, the Global Part Supply Chain project at HP, was initially undertaken in 2006 but typically became bogged down by sheer scale and complexity. After some changes in management approach and governance, however, the project quickly became hugely successful.

We learn how and why from Paul Evans, Worldwide Marketing Lead on Applications Transformation at HP. The interview is conducted by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.


The latest BriefingsDirect panel discussion centers on improving data-center productivity by leveraging all available sourcing options and moving to modernized applications and infrastructure.

IT leaders now face a set of complex choices, knowing that discretionary and capital IT spending remain tight, even as demand on their systems increases. Economists are now seeing the recession giving a way to growth, at least in several important sectors and regions. Chances are that demands on IT systems to meet this growing economic activity will occur before IT budgets appreciably go up.

So what to do? A panel of experts examines here how to gain new capacity from existing data centers through both modernization and savvy exploitation of all sourcing options. And -- by outsourcing smartly, migrating applications strategically, and modernizing effectively -- IT leaders can improve productivity while still under tightly managed costs.

One choice that may be the least attractive is to stand still as the recovery gets under way and demands on energy and application support outstrips labor, systems supply, and available electricity.

Learn more on managing for growth by examining three data-center transformation examples that uncover how effective applications and infrastructure modernization improves enterprise IT capacity outcomes. The panel also examines modernization in the context of outsourcing and hybrid sourcing, so that the capacity goals facing IT leaders can be more easily and affordably met, even in the midst of a fast-changing economy.

Please welcome the panel: Shawna Rudd, Product Marketing Manager for Data Center Services at HP; Larry Acklin, Product Marketing Manager for Applications Modernization Services at HP, and Doug Oathout, Vice President for Converged Infrastructure in HP’s Enterprise Services. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.


This latest BriefingsDirect enterprise technology update discussion focuses on how technology suppliers can get the most from resource utilization and management in the global services economy.

Increasingly, sellers of IT are finding it harder to win large software and hardware capital purchases contracts, which traditionally followed three- to seven-year obsolescence and refresh cycles. The shifts in technology and business models accelerated by the recession are forcing these vendors in particular to adopt more of a professional services revenue model.

Buyers of technology, on the other hand, are moving to IT shared services and software-as-a-service (SaaS) models to get off of the capital outlays roller coaster. They want smoother and more predictable operating and charging models, beginning with long-term professional services and outsourcing engagements.

Both the buyer and seller of services therefore need to focus on the implementation and integration of solutions, placing a complex burden on the services delivery personnel themselves, as well as those who managing the services providers.

We’re here to find out some new, best ways of managing and automating these intellectual resources that support the professional services lifecycle. We’ll see how recent research shows that more of a just-in-time (JIT) methodology is required to keep the skills in balance with myriad project requirements and obligations.

To learn more about resource utilization and management in the global services economy, we're joined by Lori Ellsworth, Vice President of Changepoint Solutions at Compuware, the sponsor of this podcast, and by Mark Sloan, Chief Operating Officer of RTM Consulting. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: Compuware.

For more information on resource utilization, read RTM's whitepaper "The ROI of Resource Utilization -- Measuring and Capturing the Real Business Value of Your People."

Learn more about Compuware Changepoint.


Can software-as-a-service (SaaS) applications actually accelerate the use and power of business analytics?

We're going to help answer that by examining a human capital management (HCM) and enterprise resource planning (ERP) SaaS provider, Workday, and show how easily customizable views on data and analytics can have a big impact on how managers and knowledge workers operate.

Historically, the back office business applications that support companies have been distinct from the category of business intelligence (BI). Certainly, applications have had certain ways of extracting analytics, but the interfaces were often complex, unique, and infrequently used.

By using SaaS applications and rich Internet technologies that create different interface capabilities -- as well as a wellspring of integration and governance on the back-end of these business applications (built on a common architecture) -- more actionable data gets to those who can use it best. They get to use it on their terms, as our case today will show, for HCM or human resources managers in large enterprises.

The trick to making this work is to balance the needs that govern and control the data and analytics, but also opening up the insights to more users in a flexible, intuitive way. The ability to identify, gather, and manipulate data for business analysis on the terms of the end-user has huge benefits. As we enter what I like to call the data-driven decade, I think nearly all business decisions are going to need more data from now on.

To learn more about how the application and interfaces are the analytics please join me in welcoming Stan Swete, Vice President of Product Strategy and the CTO at Workday; Jim Kobielus, Senior Analyst for BI and Analytics at Forrester Research, and Seth Grimes, Principal Consultant at Alta Plana Corp., and a contributing editor at TechWeb's Intelligent Enterprise. The discussion is moderated by me, BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: Workday.
Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Workday_Brings_Power_of_BI_to_SaaS_ERP_Apps_Users.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:49pm EDT

The headlines these days are full of big, embarrassing corporate and government "gotchas."

These complex snafus cost a ton of money, severely damage a company’s reputation, and most importantly, can hurt or even kill people.

From global auto recalls to bank failures to exploding oil rigs, and cyber crime that can uproot the private information from millions of users, the scale and damage that technology-accelerated glitches can inflict on businesses and individuals has probably never been higher. So what is at the root?

Is it a technology run amok problem, or a complexity spinning out of control issue -- and why is it seemingly worse now?

A new book is coming out this summer that explores the relationship between glitches and technology, specifically the role of software use and development in the era of cloud computing.

It turns out the role and impact of governance over people, process, and technology comes up again and again in the new book.

BriefingsDirect's latest podcast discussion then focuses on the nature of, and some possible solutions for, a growing parade of enterprise-scale glitches.

We interview the author of the book as well as a software expert from IBM to delve into the causes and effects of glitches and how governance relates to the problem and fixes.

Please join guests, Jeff Papows, President and CEO of WebLayers, and the author of Glitch: The Hidden Impact of Faulty Software, and Kerrie Holley, IBM fellow and Chief Technology Officer for IBM’s SOA Center of Excellence. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: WebLayers. Learn more about the book and how to order a copy.


Today's sponsored podcast discussion delves into how to better harness the power of information to drive and improve business insights.

We’ll examine how the tough economy has accelerated the progression toward more data-driven business decisions. To enable speedy proactive business analysis, information management (IM) has arisen as an essential ingredient for making business intelligence (BI) for these decisions pay off.

Yet IM itself can become unwieldy, as well as difficult to automate and scale. So managing IM has become an area for careful investment. Where then should those investments be made for the highest analytic business return? How do companies better compete through the strategic and effective use of its information?

We’ll look at some use case scenarios with executives from HP to learn how effective IM improves customer outcomes, while also identifying where costs can be cut through efficiency and better business decisions.

To get to the root of IM best practices and value, please join me in welcoming our guests, Brooks Esser, Worldwide Marketing Lead for Information Management Solutions at HP; John Santaferraro, Director of Marketing and Industry Communications for BI Solutions at HP, and Vickie Farrell, Manager of Market Strategy for BI Solutions at HP. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or
download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: HP.

Get a free white paper on how Business Intelligence enables enterprises to better manage data and information assets:
Top 10 trends in Business Intelligence for 2010


The latest BriefingsDirect podcast hones in on managing risks and rewards in the proper placement of enterprise data in cloud computing environments.

Headlines tell us that Internet-based threats are becoming increasingly malicious, damaging, and sophisticated. These reports come just as more companies are adopting cloud practices and placing mission-critical data into cloud hosts, both public and private. Cloud skeptics frequently point to security risks as a reason for cautiously using cloud services. It’s the security around sensitive data that seems to concern many folks inside of enterprises.

There are also regulations and compliance issues that can vary from location to location, country to country and industry by industry. Yet cloud advocates point to the benefits of systemic security as an outcome of cloud architectures and methods. Distributed events and strategies based on cloud computing security solutions should therefore be a priority and prompt even more enterprise data to be stored, shared, and analyzed by a cloud by using strong governance and policy-driven controls.

So, where’s the reality amid the mixed perceptions and vision around cloud-based data? More importantly, what should those evaluating cloud services know about data and security solutions that will help to make their applications and data less vulnerable in general?

We've assembled a panel of HP experts to delve into the dos and don’ts of cloud computing and corporate data. Please welcome Christian Verstraete, Chief Technology Officer for Manufacturing and Distributions Industries Worldwide at HP, and Archie Reed, HP's Chief Technologist for Cloud Security, the author of several publications including, The Definitive Guide to Identity Management and he's working on a new book, The Concise Guide to Cloud Computing. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Putting_More_Data_in_Cloud_Has_Many_Benefits.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:56pm EDT

There's a huge drive now for improved enterprise data center performance. Nearly all enterprises are involved nowadays with some level of data-center transformation, either in the planning stages or in outright build-out.

We're seeing many instances where numerous data centers are being consolidated into a powerful core few, as well as completely new, so-called green-field, data centers with modern design and facilities coming online. The heightened activity runs the gamut from retrofitting and designing new data centers to the building and occupying of them.

The latest definition of data center is focused on being what's called fit-for-purpose, of using best practices and assessments of existing assets and correctly projecting future requirements to get that data center just right -- productive, flexible, efficient and well-understood and managed.

Yet these are, by no means, trivial projects. They often involve a tremendous amount of planning and affect IT, facilities, and energy planners. The payoffs are potentially huge, as we'll see, from doing data center design properly -- but the risks are also quite high, if things don't come out as planned.

This podcast examines the lifecycle of data-center design and fulfillment by exploring a successful project at Valero Energy Corp. We're here with two executives from HP and an IT leader at Valero Energy to look at proper planning, data center design and project management.

Please join me in welcoming Cliff Moore, America’s PMO Lead for Critical Facilities Consulting at HP; John Bennett, Worldwide Director of Data Center Transformation Solutions at HP, and John Vann, Vice President of Technical Infrastructure and Operations at Valero Energy Corp. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.


Data protection has grown significantly more complex in recent years as workers have gravitated to notebook computers and the mobility they enable. The latest BriefingsDirect podcast discussion looks at protecting PC-based data in an increasingly mobile world.

We'll look at a use case -- at Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, NY -- for HP Data Protector Notebook Extension (DPNE) software and examine how backup and recovery software has evolved to become more transparent, reliable, and fundamentally user-driven.


Gain more information on HP Data protection Notebook Extension. Follow on Twitter.
Access a Webcast with IDC's Laura DuBois on Avoiding Risk and Improving Productivity on PCs and Laptops.

Using that continuous back-up principle, the latest notebook and PC backup software captures every saved version of a file, efficiently transfers it all in batches to a central storage location, and then makes it easily and safely accessible for recovery by user from anywhere. That's inside or outside of the corporate firewall.

We'll look at how DPNE slashes IT recovery chores, allows for managed policies and governance to reduce data risks systemically, while also downsizing backups, the use of bandwidth, and storage.

The economies are compelling. The cost of data lost can be more than $400,000 annually for an average-sized business with 5,000 users. Getting a handle on recovery cost, therefore, helps reduce the total cost of operating and supporting mobile PCs, both in terms of operations and in the cost of lost or poorly recovered assets.

To help us better understand the state of the art remote in mobile PC data protection, we're joined by an HP executive and a user of HP DPNE software, Shari Cravens, Product Marketing Manager for HP Data Protection, and a user of DPNE, John Ferguson, Network Systems Specialist at Roswell Park Cancer Institute in Buffalo, NY. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download the transcript. Sponsor: HP.


Special offer: Download a free, supported 30-day trial of Active Endpoint's ActiveVOS at www.activevos.com/insight.


The latest BriefingsDirect Analyst Insights Edition, Vol. 51, focuses on cloud computing and dollars and cents. Our panel dives into more than the technology, security, and viability issues that have dominated a lot of cloud discussions lately -- and move to the economics and the impact on buyers and sellers of cloud services.

When you ask any one person how cloud will affect their costs, you're bound to get a different answer each time. No one really knows, but the agreement comes when the questions move to, "Will cloud models impact how buyers and providers price their technology? And over the long-term what will buyers come to expect in terms of IT value?"

What comes when we move to a cloud based pay-per value pricing, buying, and budgeting for IT approach? How does the shift to high-volume, low-margin services and/or subscription models affect the IT vendor landscape? How does it affect the pure cloud and software-as-a-service (SaaS) providers, and perhaps most importantly, how do cloud models affect the buy side?

Join the panel of Dave Linthicum, CTO of Bick Group, a cloud computing and data-center consulting firm; Michael Krigsman, CEO of Asuret and a blogger on ZDNet on IT failures as well as writer of analyst reports for IDC, and Sandy Rogers, an independent industry analyst.
 

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Charter Sponsor: Active Endpoints.

Special offer: Download a free, supported 30-day trial of Active Endpoint's ActiveVOSat www.activevos.com/insight.


The latest BriefingsDirect podcast discussion comes in conjunction with The Open Group’s Enterprise Architecture Practitioners Conference held earlier this month in Seattle. We assembled a panel to examine service-oriented architecture (SOA) and cloud computing -- the relationships, the inter-reliance and the realities. Three years ago, the IT transformation poster child was SOA, and now we're well into the hype curve around cloud computing, but has one actually given way to the other? Are they linear in their relationship, or perhaps mutually dependent in some ways, and to what degree? We’ll explore now whether SOA has found new value and relevance as a foundation and perhaps catalyst for cloud computing, especially for so-called private clouds. And, we'll see how the emergence of SOA and cloud may be happening in different places inside of enterprises. Shouldn’t one hand get to quickly know what the other is up to and perhaps even work together? There are a series of podcasts from The Open Group conference: on cloud computing, enterprise architecture, business architecture, Archimate, and cloud security. Here with us now to plumb the depths of how SOA and cloud computing do or don’t come together, are Dr. Chris Harding, director of the SOA Work Group at The Open Group; Stephen G. Bennett, Senior Enterprise Architect at Oracle, and Peter Coffee, Director of Platform Search for Salesforce.com. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions. Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-SOA_and_Cloud_Combined_Marks_an_IT_Turning_Point.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 8:57am EDT

Nowadays, CIOs need to both cut costs and increase performance. Energy has never been more important in working toward this productivity advantage.

It's now time for IT leaders to gain control over energy use -- and misuse -- in enterprise data centers. More often than not, very little energy capacity analysis and planning is being done on data centers that are five years old or older. Even newer data centers don’t always gather and analyze the available energy data being created amid all of the components.

Finally, smarter, more comprehensive energy planning tools and processes are being directed at this problem. It reqiures a lifecycle approach from the data centers to more toward fuller automation.

And so automation software for capacity planning and monitoring has been newly designed and improved to best match long-term energy needs and resources in ways that cut total costs, while gaining the available capacity from old and new data centers.

Such data gathering, analysis and planning can break the inefficiency cycle that plagues many data centers where hotspots can mismatch cooling needs, and underused and under-needed servers are burning up energy needlessly. These so-called Smart Grid solutions jointly cut data center energy costs, reduce carbon emissions, and can dramatically free up capacity from overburdened or inefficient infrastructure.

By gaining far more control over energy use and misuse, solutions such as Hewlett Packard's (HP) Smart Grid for Data Center can increase capacity from existing facilities by 30-50 percent.

This podcast features two executives from HP to delve more deeply into the notion of Smart Grid for Data Center. Now join Doug Oathout, Vice President of Green IT Energy Servers and Storage at HP, and John Bennett, Worldwide Director of Data Center Transformation Solutions at HP. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: Hewlett-Packard.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Smart_Grid_Concept_Comes_to_Data_Centers.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 10:24am EDT

Improved data center productivity now appears to be a natural progression from converged infrastructure. Many enterprise data centers have embraced a shared service management model to some degree, and now converged infrastructure applies the shared service model more broadly to leverage modular system design and open standards, as well as to advance proven architectural frameworks.

The result is a realignment of traditional technology silos into adaptive pools that can be shared by any application, as well as optimized and managed as ongoing services. Under this model, resources are dynamically provisioned efficiently and automatically, gaining more business results productivity. This also helps rebalance IT spending away from a majority of spend on operations and more toward investments, innovations, and business improvements.

This latest BriefingsDirect discussion explores the benefits of a converged infrastructure approach, and now how to better understand attaining a transformed data center environment. We'll see how converged infrastructure provides a stepping stone to private cloud initiatives. But, as with any convergence, there are a lot of moving parts, including people, skills, processes, services, outsourcing options, and partner ecosystems.

We're here with two executives from Hewlett-Packard (HP) to delve deeply into converged infrastructure and to learn more about how to get started and deal with some of the complexity, as well as to know what to expect as payoff. Please welcome Doug Oathout, Vice President, Converged Infrastructure at HP Storage, Servers, and Networking, and John Bennett, Worldwide Director, Data Center Transformation Solutions at HP. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

For more information on virtualization and how it provides a foundation for Private Cloud, plan to attend the HP Cloud Virtual Conference taking place in March. To register for this event, go to:
Asia, Pacific, Japan - March 2
Europe Middle East and Africa - March 3
Americas - March 4

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: Hewlett-Packard.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-A_Focus_on_Converged_Infrastructure.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 4:14pm EDT

Special offer: Download a free, supported 30-day trial of Active Endpoint's ActiveVOS at www.activevos.com/insight.

The next BriefingsDirect Analyst Insights Edition, Volume 49, hones in on the predictions for IT industry growth and impact, now that the recession appears to have bottomed out. We're going to ask our distinguished panel of analysts and experts for their top five predictions for IT growth through 2010 and beyond.

This periodic discussion and dissection of IT infrastructure related news and events with a panel of industry analysts and guests, comes to you with the help of our charter sponsor Active Endpoints, maker of the ActiveVOS business process management system.

To help us gaze into the IT trends crystal ball we are joined by our panel:  Jim Kobielus, senior analyst at Forrester Research; Joe McKendrick, independent analyst and prolific blogger; Tony Baer, senior analyst at Ovum; Brad Shimmin, principal analyst at Current Analysis; Dave Linthicum, CEO of Blue Mountain Labs; Dave Lounsbury, vice-president of collaboration services at The Open Group; Jason Bloomberg, managing partner at ZapThink, and JP Morgenthal, independent analyst and IT consultant. The discussion is moderator Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions. [Disclosure: The Open Group is a sponsor of BriefingsDirect podcasts.]

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Charter Sponsor: Active Endpoints.

Special offer: Download a free, supported 30-day trial of Active Endpoint's ActiveVOS at www.activevos.com/insight.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Analysts_Name_Top_2New_IT_Trends_Vol_49.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 3:24pm EDT

Security may be the hottest topic in IT. But it's also one of the least understood.

So BriefingDirect assembled a panel this week to examine the need for IT security to run more like a data-driven science, rather than a mysterious art form.

Rigorously applying data and metrics to security can dramatically improve IT results and reduce overall risk to the business. By employing and applying more metrics and standards to security, the protection of IT becomes better, and the known threats can become evaluated uniformly.

Standards like Information Security Management Maturity Model (SM3) are helping to not only gain greater visibility, but also allowing IT leaders to scale security best practices repeatably and reliably.

With standards and greater reliance on data, security practitioners can understand better what they are up against, perhaps gaining close to real-time responses. They can know what's working -- or is not working -- both inside and outside of their organization.

The security metrics panel and sponsored podcast discussion are coming to you from The Open Group’s Enterprise Architecture Practitioners Conference in Seattle on Feb. 2, 2010. The goal is to determine the strategic imperatives for security metrics, and to discuss how to use them to change the outcomes in terms of IT’s value to the business.

Our panel consists of a security executive from The Open Group, as well as two experts on security who are presenting at the consortium's Security Practitioners Conference: Jim Hietala, Vice President for Security at The Open Group; Adam Shostack, co-author of The New School of Information Security, and Vicente Aceituno, director of the ISM3 Consortium. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-IT_Security_Standard_Gains_Traction.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 4:50pm EDT

Our next podcast discussion looks at ArchiMate, a way of conceptualizing, modeling, and controlling enterprise architecture (EA) and business architecture.

ArchiMate provides ways to develop visualizations and control to beyond some of the confines of IT architecture to more swiftly obtain business benefits. To learn more, we interview an expert on this, Dr. Harmen van den Berg, partner and co-founder at BiZZdesign.

This podcast was recorded Feb. 2 at The Open Group’s Enterprise Architecture Practitioners Conference in Seattle the week of Feb. 1, 2010. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Archimate_Advances_IT_Architecture.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 11:53pm EDT

What's the difference between enterprise architecture (EA) and business architecture (BA)? We pose the question to Tim Westbrock, Managing Director of EAdirections, as part of a sponsored podcast discussion coming to you from The Open Group’s Enterprise Architecture Practitioners Conference in Seattle, the week of Feb. 1, 2010.

Enterprise business architecture is a set of artifacts and methods that helps business leaders make decisions about direction and communicate the changes that are required in order to achieve that vision, says Westbrock. Learn more from the podcast.

The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Enterprise_Architect_Role_Gains_Stature.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 7:50pm EDT

This live event podcast discussion comes to you from The Open Group’s Enterprise Architecture Practitioners Conference in Seattle, the week of Feb. 1, 2010.

The notion of enterprise architecture (EA) has been in works for 30 years. But now the evolving maturity of IT -- and the importance of IT in modern business -- makes this concept of enterprise architecture especially important.

We therefore examine the newer definitions and role of the IT architect and how that might be shifting with an expert from the Open Group, Len Fehskens, Vice President of Skills and Capabilities. The interview is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Best_Definition_of_Enterprise_Architecture.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 6:02pm EDT

Welcome to a special BriefingsDirect dual webinar and podcast presentation, Real-Time Web Data Services in Action at Deutsche Börse.

As the culmination of a four-part series on web data services (WDS), we're here to examine a fascinating use-case for data services with Deutsche Börse Group in Frankfurt, Germany. An innovative information service recently created there highlights how real-time content and data assembled from various online sources scattered across the Web provides a valuable analysis service.

The offering supports energy traders seeking to track global fluctuations and micro trends in oil and other related markets. But, the need for real-time and precise data affects more than energy traders and financial professionals. More than ever, all sorts of businesses need to know what's going on in and what's being said about their respective markets, products, and services.

In this series with Kapow Technologies, we've examined the need for WDS and ways that WDS and related tools can be used broadly to solve these problems. Now, we are going to learn the full story of how Deutsche Börse took web data resources, and not only efficiently assembled knowledge from automated robots, cleansing tools, and analytics management, but from these capabilities they also created high value and focused WDS offerings onto itself.

Thanks for joining us, as we take an in-depth look at how the market for WDS has shaped up and then hear directly from the leader of the Deutsche Börse project, as well as from a key supplier that supported them in accomplishing their web services goal.

So, to learn more about WDS as a business, please welcome our guests, Mario Schultz, director of Energy Facts at Deutsche Börse Group, and Stefan Andreasen, CTO at Kapow Technologies. The discussion is moderated by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.


 Read a full transcript or download the transcript. Learn more. Sponsor: Kapow Technologies.


Access the full series of podcasts on web data services:

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Web_Data_Services_in_Action.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:31pm EDT

What are the likely directions for cloud computing? Based on the exploration of expected cloud benefits at a cutting edge global IT organization, the future looks extremely productive.

In this podcast we focus on the thinking on how cloud computing -- both the private and public varieties -- might be used at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Geneva.

CERN has long been an influential bellwether on how extreme IT problems can be solved. Indeed, the World Wide Web owes a lot of its usefulness to early work done at CERN. Now the focus is on cloud computing. How real is it, and how might an organization like CERN approach cloud?

In many ways CERN is quite possibly the New York of cloud computing. If cloud can make it there, it can probably make it anywhere. That's because CERN deals with fantastically large data sets, massive throughput requirements, a global workforce, finite budgets, and an emphasis on standards and openness.

So please join us, as we track the evolution of high-performance computing (HPC) from clusters to grid to cloud models through the eyes of CERN, and with analysis and perspective from IDC, as well as technical thought leadership from Platform Computing.

Join me in welcoming our panel today: Tony Cass, Group Leader for Fabric Infrastructure and Operations at CERN; Steve Conway, Vice President in the High Performance Computing Group at IDC, and Randy Clark, Chief Marketing Officer at Platform Computing. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: Platform Computing.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-CERN_on_Potential_for_Cloud_Computing.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:42pm EDT

The latest BriefingsDirect Analyst Insights Edition, Volume 50, focuses on the fallout from the Google’s threat to pull out of China, due to a series of sophisticated hacks and attacks on Google, as well as a dozen more IT companies. Due to the attacks late last year, Google on Jan. 12 vowed to stop censoring Internet content for China’s web users and possibly to leave the country altogether.

This ongoing tiff between Google and the Internet control authorities in China’s Communist Party-dominated government have uncorked a Pandora’s Box of security, free speech and corporate espionage issues. There are human rights issues and free speech issues, questions on China’s actual role, trade and fairness issues, and the point about Google’s policy of initially enabling Internet censorship and now apparently backtracking.

But, there are also larger issues around security and Internet governance in general. Those are the issues we’ll be focusing on today. So, even as the U.S. State Department and others in the U.S. federal government seek answers on China’s purported role or complicity in the attacks, the repercussions on cloud computing and enterprise security are profound and may be long-term.

We’re going to look at some of the answers to what this donnybrook means for how enterprises should best protect their intellectual property from such sophisticated hackers as government, military or, quasi-government corporate entities and whether cloud services providers like Google are better than your average enterprise, or especially medium-sized business, at thwarting such risks.

We'll look at how users of cloud computing should trust or not trust providers of such mission-critical cloud services as email, calendar, word processing, document storage, databases, and applications hosting. And, we’ll look at how enterprise architecture, governance, security best practices, standards, and skills need to adapt still to meet these new requirements from insidious world-class threats.

This periodic discussion and dissection of IT infrastructure related news and events with a panel of industry analysts and guests, comes to you with the help of our charter sponsor Active Endpoints, maker of the ActiveVOS business process management system.

So, join me now in welcoming our panel for today’s discussion: Jim Kobielus, senior analyst at Forrester Research; Jason Bloomberg, managing partner at ZapThink; Jim Hietala, Vice President for Security at The Open Group; Elinor Mills, senior writer at CNET, and Michael Dortch, Director of Research at Focus .The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download the transcript. Charter Sponsor: Active Endpoints.

Special offer: Download a free, supported 30-day trial of Active Endpoint's ActiveVOS at www.activevos.com/insight.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Analysts_Probe_Google_China_Tiff-Vol_50.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 10:13am EDT

BriefingsDirect now presents a sponsored podcast discussion on the ongoing activities of The Open Group’s Cloud Computing Work Group. We'll meet and talk to the new co-chairmen of the Cloud Work Group, learn about their roles and expectations, and get a first-hand account of the group’s 2010 plans.

Join us as we examine the evolution of cloud, how businesses are grappling with that, and how they can learn to best exploit cloud-computing benefits, while fully understanding and controlling the risks. These topics and ore will also be under discussion at The Open Group's Architecture Practitioners and Security Practitioners conferences this week in Seattle.

In many ways, cloud computing marks an inflection point for many different elements of IT, and forms a convergence of other infrastructure categories that weren’t necessarily working in concert in the past. That makes cloud interesting, relevant, and potentially dramatic in its impact. What has been less clear is how businesses stand to benefit. What are the likely paybacks and how enterprises can prepare for the best outcomes?

We're here with an executive from The Open Group, as well as the new co-chairmen of the Cloud Work Group, to look at the business implications of cloud computing and how to get a better handle on the whole subject.

Please join David Lounsbury, Vice President for Collaboration Services at The Open Group; Karl Kay, IT Architecture Executive with Bank of America, and co-chairman of the Cloud Work Group, and Robert Orshaw, IBM Cloud Computing Executive, and co-chair of the Cloud Work Group. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Sponsor: The Open Group.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Open_Group_Cloud_Work_Group_Mission.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 4:32pm EDT

The growing interest and value in PC desktop virtualization strategies and approaches has its roots in both technology and economics. Recently, a lot has happened technically that has matured the performance and economic benefits of desktop virtualization and the use of thin-client devices.

At the same time as this functional maturity improved, we are approaching an inflection point in a market that is accepting of new clients and new client approaches like desktop virtualization.

Indeed, the latest desktop virtualization model empowers enterprises with lower total costs, greater management of software, tighter security, and the ability to exploit low-cost, low-energy thin client devices. It's an offer that more enterprises are going to find hard to refuse.

In desktop virtualization, the workhorse is the server, and the client assists. This allows for easier management, support, upgrades, provisioning, and control of data and applications. Users can also take their unique desktop experience to any supported device, connect, and pick up where they left off. And, there are now new offline benefits too.

Here to help us learn more about the role and outlook for desktop virtualization, we're joined by Jeff Groudan, vice president of Thin Computing Solutions at HP. The BriefingsDirect interview is conducted by Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: Hewlett-Packard.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Desktop_Virtualization_Ready_for_Enterprise_Uptake.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 8:49am EDT

The latest BriefingsDirect podcast discussion delves into proper planning and implementation of data-center virtualization to gain strategic level advantage in enterprises.

Because companies generally begin their use of server virtualization at a tactical level, there is often a complex hurdle in expanding the use of virtualization. Analysts predict that virtualization will support upwards of half of server workloads in just a few years. Yet, we are already seeing gaps between an enterprise’s expectations and their ability to aggressively adopt virtualization without stumbling in some way.

These gaps can involve issues around people, process and technology and often, all three in some combination. Process refinement, proper methodological involvement, and swift problem management often provide proven risk reduction, and provide surefire ways of avoiding pitfalls as virtualization use moves to higher scale.

The goal becomes one of a lifecycle orchestration and governed management approach to virtualization efforts so that the business outcomes, as well as the desired IT efficiencies, are accomplished.

Areas that typically need to be part of any strategic virtualization drive include sufficient education, skilled acquisition, and training. Outsourcing, managed mixed sourcing, and consulting around implementation and operational management are also essential. Then, there are the usual needs around hardware, platforms and system as well as software, testing and integration.

So, we’re here with a panel of Hewlett Packard (HP) executives to examine in-depth the challenges of large scale successful virtualization adoption. We’ll look at how a supplier like HP can help fill the gaps that can hinder virtualization payoffs.

Please join me in welcoming our panel: Tom Clement, worldwide portfolio manager in HP Education Services; Bob Meyer, virtualization solutions lead with HP Enterprise Business; Dionne Morgan, worldwide marketing manager at HP Technology Services; Ortega Pittman, worldwide product marketing, HP Enterprise Services, and Ryan Reed, worldwide marketing manager at HP Enterprise Business. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's
Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript of the podcast, or download a copy. Sponsor: Hewlett-Packard.

For more information on virtualization and how it provides a foundation for private clouds, plan to attend the HP Cloud Virtual Conference in March. Register now for this event:
Asia, Pacific, Japan - March 2
Europe Middle East and Africa - March 3
Americas - March 4

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Strategic_Approach_to_Virtualization_Services.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 5:53pm EDT

The latest BriefingsDirect podcast discussion hones in on storage virtualization. You've heard a lot about server virtualization over the past few years, and many enterprises have adopted virtual servers to improve their ability to manage runtime workloads and high utilization rates to cut total cost.

But, as a sibling to server virtualization, storage virtualization has some strong benefits of its own, not the least of which is the ability to better support server virtualization and make it more successful.

We'll look at how storage virtualization works, where it fits in, and why it makes a lot of sense. The cost savings metrics alone caught me by surprise, making me question why we haven't been talking about storage and server virtualization efforts in the same breath over these past several years.

Here to help understand how to better take advantage of storage virtualization, we're joined by Mike Koponen, HP's StorageWorks Worldwide Solutions marketing manager. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Learn more. Sponsor: Hewlett-Packard.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Storage_Virtualization_Comes_of_Age.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 12:56pm EDT

The latest BriefingsDirect Analyst Insights Edition, Volume 48, centers on the IT job landscape for 2010. We interview David Foote, CEO and chief research officer, as well as co-founder, at Foote Partners LLC of Vero Beach, Fla.

David closely tracks the hiring and human resources trends across the IT landscape. He'll share his findings of where the recession has taken IT hiring and where the recovery will shape up. We'll also look at what skills are going to be in demand and which ones are not. David will help those in IT, or those seeking to enter IT, identify where the new job opportunities lie.

This periodic discussion and dissection of IT infrastructure related news and events, with a panel of industry analysts and guests, comes to you with the help of our charter sponsor, Active Endpoints, maker of the ActiveVOS business process management system, and through the support of TIBCO Software. I'm your host and moderator Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions.

Read a full transcript or download a copy. Find it on iTunes/iPod and Podcast.com. Learn more. Charter Sponsor: Active Endpoints. Also sponsored by TIBCO Software.

Special offer: Download a free, supported 30-day trial of Active Endpoint's ActiveVOS at www.activevos.com/insight.

Gain additional data and analysis from Foote Partners on the IT jobs market.

Direct download: BriefingsDirect-IT_Jobs_Market_for_2010.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 11:28am EDT

A growing number of technical and economic incentives are mounting that make a strong case for modernizing and transforming enterprise mainframe applications -- and the aging infrastructure that support them. IT budget planners are using the strident economic environment to force a harder look at alternatives to inflexible and hard-to-manage legacy systems, especially as enterprises seek to cut their total and long-term IT operations spending. The rationale around reducing total costs is also forcing a recognition of the intrinsic difference between core applications and so-called context -- context being applications that are there for commodity productivity reasons, not for core innovation, customization or differentiation. With a commodity productivity application, the most effective delivery is on the lowest-cost platform or from a provider. The problem is that 20 or 30 years ago, people put everything on mainframes. They wrote it all in code. The challenge now is how to free up the applications that are not offering any differentiation -- and do not need to be on a mainframe -- and which could be running on a much more lower cost infrastructure, or come from a completely different means of delivery, such as software as a service (SaaS). There are demonstrably much less expensive ways of delivering such plain vanilla applications and services, and significant financial rewards for separating the core from the context in legacy enterprise implementations. This discussion is the third and final in a sponsored series that examines "Application Transformation: Getting to the Bottom Line." The series coincides with a trio of Hewlett-Packard (HP) virtual conferences on the same subject.
Access the regional Asia Pacific conference, the EMEA conference, or the Americas event.
Helping to examine how alternatives to mainframe computing can work, we're joined by John Pickett, worldwide mainframe modernization program manager at HP; Les Wilson, America's mainframe modernization director at HP, and Paul Evans, worldwide marketing lead on applications transformation at HP. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions. Read a full transcript of the discussion or download a copy. Sponsor: HP.
Direct download: BriefingsDirect-Mainframe_Alternatives_v2.mp3
Category:podcasts -- posted at: 2:58pm EDT

New architectures for data and logic processing are ushering in a game-changing era of advanced analytics. These new approaches support massive data sets to produce powerful insights and analysis -- yet with unprecedented price-performance. As we enter 2010, enterprises are including more forms of diverse data into their business intelligence (BI) activities. They're also diversifying the types of analysis that they expect from these investments. At the same time, more kinds and sizes of companies and government agencies are seeking to deliver ever more data-driven analysis for their employees, partners, users, and citizens. It boils down to giving more communities of participants what they need to excel at whatever they're doing. By putting analytics into the hands of more decision makers, huge productivity wins across entire economies become far more likely. But such improvements won’t happen if the data can't effectively reach the application's logic, if the systems can't handle the massive processing scale involved, or the total costs and complexity are too high. In this sponsored podcast discussion we examine how convergence of data and logic, of parallelism and MapReduce -- and of a hunger for precise analysis with a flood of raw new data -- are all setting the stage for powerful advanced analytics outcomes. To help learn how to attain advanced analytics and to uncover the benefits from these new architectural activities for ubiquitous BI, we're joined by Jim Kobielus, senior analyst at Forrester Research, and Sharmila Mulligan, executive vice president of marketing at Aster Data Systems. The discussion is moderated by BriefingsDirect's Dana Gardner, principal analyst at Interarbor Solutions. Read a full transcript of the podcast, or download a copy. Sponsor: Aster Data Systems.