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Establishing a Reserve Data Center
At present, establishing reserve data centers could be recommended to almost any organization and company that hopes to ensure business continuity and avoid possible financial losses associated with the failure of the main databases.
"Selling" Agile
Radioactive Walrus Redux
It is depressing to see that the "Jumping the Radioactive Walrus" syndrome is alive and well in the US as well as in Japan. According to a recent report by the US Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, the safety culture at the Hanford nuclear waste treatment and immobilization plant in Washington State is "flawed and effectively defeats" the 20-year Department of Energy (DOE) requirement that there be "a culture that encourages setting and maintaining high standards.
Risk Allusions and Illusions
Product Not Process
Recently, my old friend and colleague Conrad Weisert sent me an enormously important new manifesto, entitled "Programming Standards & Methodology Manifesto,"1 which argues that software engineering should focus on the product rather than the process. And he does this in little over a page of clearly articulated prose.
The Public Clouds Are Coming Faster
IT + Crowds: Wisdom or Madness?
For several years now, I've been writing articles and reports for the Cutter Consortium about crowdsourcing in general, about the emergence of innovation intermediaries to support crowdsourcing, and about the various phenomena that demonstrate the power of crowds, such as open source software and user-generated content.
Seven Insider Guidelines for Outsourcing Agreements
Outsourcing suppliers, not surprisingly -- given their close-up view and their numerous bidding and contract experiences -- can be very insightful about clients. What they would tell clients if they could is a mix of observation and frequently helpful advice that ranges from the objective to the self-interested.
Mysterious Appeal
Cutter Fellow Rob Austin and I are completing a book on innovation, The Soul of Design: The Surprising Power of Plot to Enhance Product and Service Experiences (forthcoming from Stanford University Press, 2012).
Servicing Technical Debt
Just as giving a teenager a credit card without a limit is a guaranteed disaster, letting an organization rack up technical debt without restriction will inevitably lead to an unmaintainable state. The simple reason for this is that without clear cost tradeoffs, the business cannot make the hard decision to give up value today for increased agility tomorrow.
The Coming Tsunami: In-Memory Databases, Part II
In last week's Advisor, I began a discussion of SAP's new HANA architecture (see "The Coming Tsunami: In-Memory Databases, Part I," 16 June 2011).
The Benefits of Business Architecture
Business architecture is gaining recognition as a game-changing discipline that enables businesses to address major challenges in new and unique ways. Simply put, business architecture allows a business to establish a common vocabulary, shared vision, and a degree of transparency that facilitates initiatives ranging from M&As to the reversal of customer attrition.
What Is "Big Data"?
Technology around Big Data management has become of interest to most organizations due to the huge leap in the volume of data currently available and the expected geometric growth in volumes in the near future. One reason for the massive growth in data volumes comes from the reduction in size and cost of monitoring equipment, such as location monitoring of cell phones and RFID tag technology. People and things are constantly giving out information about their location and status.
Cloud-Based/SaaS Predictive Analytics: What's the Outlook?
I've been saying for some time now that the advent of cloud-based predictive analytics offerings -- such as those from in2Clouds, Predixion Software, and Quiterian -- is an important development due to its potential to stir up the market for data mining and predictive analytics. A Cutter Consortium survey1 in February/March 2011 sheds some light on the use of these products.
Pitfalls of Agile XIV: KanBut
The Coming Tsunami: In-Memory Databases, Part I
SAP may have dished up a fastball high and inside, just under the chin. The target: its database competitors.
After spending time looking at the architecture for HANA, the new Intel-based BI appliance SAP has been working on, it is clear to me that this technology just might be very, very disruptive.
Computers Don't Know All the Answers
From the simplest to the most complex decisions, we like to believe that we are making them with an objective perspective and a willingness to take all the parameters and factors into account. The tragedy, however, is that we often don’t give enough credit to our wealth of information in making those decisions.
How Can the CIO Lose by Implementing IT Governance?
Classification, Understanding, and Frameworks
In other words, data is a collection of unorganized/uninterrupted facts. When we put those facts in the context of a schema or classification, then we have useful information. When we put that information into the context of experience, then we have knowledge. When we apply that knowledge to add value, then we have wisdom.
Preventing Confidential Data Leaks
The requirements from business for protecting confidential information are constantly growing because the damage from disclosing such information may result in a loss of a company's competitive advantage and profits, sanctions by regulatory authorities, and even administrative and criminal liability. It is no secret that successful business performance depends on the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of corporate information.
Paying the Price: When Is Low Too Low?
Your mom said it best. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. When price gets confused with total cost, it's possible to pay more overall while still buying a lower-priced commodity. An industry insider we spoke with put it succinctly:
A lot of clients say they want savings, but they don't. They want low rates, to push the risk to someone else -- and they want to make sure that you (the outsourcer) don't make money.