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COVER STORY: Transforming the Enterprise with High-Performance Computing
Issue: March/April 2008
Transforming the Enterprise with High-Performance Computing
Two formerly separate technology worlds have collided in recent times. The once distinct line between ubiquitous “computing” and its powerful cousin, “high-performance computing”, has noticeably blurred High-performance computing was once relegated purely to scientific research and engineering applications. Today, many organizations in a variety of industries have a need for that much computing power, whether it is a banking firm evaluating financial risk or an entertainment company creating digital media. The irony is that they do not perceive their needs as ‘high performance computing’, even through they struggle with scalability and processing requirements every day.
INTERVIEW
Project Indiana: The Best of Linux & Solaris -- Q&A with Ian Murdock, Chief OS Platform Strategist, Sun Microsystems
The community first caught wind of Project Indiana when Sun Microsystems President and Chief Operating Officer Jonathan Schwartz casually mentioned it in his blog in May 2007. But as quickly as he had mentioned it, he put an equally swift cap on it because, according to him “Ian [Murdock] said it was a secret we couldn’t reveal”, at that time. A good half a year later, Sun is finally willing to spill the beans on Project Indiana, which bears upon its shoulder the overarching goal of encouraging the growth of the OpenSolaris eco-system by combining the best features of Linux and Solaris whilst at the same time making Solaris more readily comprehensible to Linux-aware developers. SDA Asia had the opportunity to sit down with Ian Murdock, Chief OS Platform Strategist of Sun Microsystems, better known as “the man behind the mission” of materializing Project Indiana to learn more about the project, its implications on enterprises, the trends and challenges of open source adoption in Asia and why open source is the way to go should enterprises want to stay competitive in the future.
Data & Storage
Easing the Pain of Disaster Recovery
It cannot be emphasized enough how imperative a good disaster recovery (DR) solution is to the well being of an organisation when it comes to protecting against data loss and site disasters, whilst maintaining the availability of critical IT services and ultimately the organisation’s reputation. However, as transparent as it may seem, there are many organisations that still side step this issue citing complexity and difficulty in managing such solutions as their main concerns. This is especially true in cases with organizations moving up the maturity curve, including Small and Medium Businesses that often rely entirely on their internal IT staff to learn and deploy new technologies, which means they need to be particularly conscious of choosing solutions that achieve results without putting a strain on budgets and staff resources. A recent trend sees vendors responding to such demands by providing simple, pre-bundled DR solutions that are tailor made - as opposed to the archaic “onesolution- fits-all” business model of the past—and capable of satisfying the various requirements organisations may have.
SPECIAL SUPPLEMENT: IT in Education
Education and IT: The opportunity for Developers and the Software industry
The World Health Organization estimates that 10% of the world’s population has a disability, making them the world’s largest minority. Within this group, 80% of the disabled population will remain unemployed and unable to support themselves. Education remains a key to enabling the disabled communities to engage in meaningful work for their livelihood. Every child with a disability can, and should, be given an equal opportunity to attain a good foundational education. While in the past, those with disabilities inevitably fell behind their peers because they lacked in good educational opportunities, things have changed today. The emphasis on knowledge over manual work and skilled labor means that physical disability is less of a handicap today, than it was in the agricultural and industrial age where dexterity and strength were vital vocational attributes. But while today’s knowledge workers no longer need to possess completely functional physical faculties, a gap still exists between the user interfaces of modern educational systems and the physical limitations of the disabled.
Accelerated Performance Boost with WAN Optimisation
Today, the Internet serves as an indispensable educational tool as it offers an almost limitless resource, transcending physical boundaries, allowing educators and students to communicate and share knowledge seamlessly. As with most companies and organisations, globalisation has pushed the educational sector to embark on new capabilities and technologies to stay competitive. With more opportunities for long distance teaching and knowledge sharing, educational institutions are using the Internet to provide for wider and easier accessibility. Unfortunately, enabling easy public access can pose some significant challenges for school officials and IT administrators.
Demystifying Internet Content Filtering for Schools and Libraries
As Internet use grows in business, so do the risks of uncontrolled access. When students inadvertently or deliberately access sites containing inappropriate, illegal, or dangerous content, schools expose themselves to legal liability, and in some cases experience degraded network performance. There are also a growing number of security risks from Trojans and worms that can be introduced into the network causing serious damage. An effective filtering solution can help solve these problems by blocking access to inappropriate Web sites. Students who visit pornographic or racist/hate sites represent a major legal liability concern. Another source of liability exposure is peer-to-peer networking and file sharing, which have opened the door to charges of copyright violations and highprofile litigation.
The Integral Role of IT in Singapore’s Education System
Information technology (IT) is a critical element in education, especially in Singapore. Not only is the management of an institution’s IT infrastructure important to ensure that organizational needs are met while costs are kept to a minimum, but including relevant IT courses in the curriculum is key to providing students with essential IT skills and knowledge that they will require when entering the workforce. With these basics in place, Singapore will then be well-placed to develop an infocomm-savvy workforce to drive national economic competitiveness and succeed as a leading IT hub in the next millennium.
Support Tools to Enrich the Learning Experience
Education is a dynamic and fast moving field, the landscape has changed rapidly, especially with the rapid developments in technology causing the traditional modes of learning to reshape and diversify. Globalization has put educational institutions all around the world in direct competition with each other to produce quality, top notch students. This has amplified the need for changes to the existing cultures and infrastructures. Discerning students too are expecting the higher institutes of learning to adept quickly in the mobilization and use of technology in teaching modes. They want to access their information online, real time and expect their schools to promote student mobility tools such as making lectures available through podcasts, submitting assignments and holding consultation with lecturers via
HP Eases IT Services Woes for Central Queensland University
Students at Central Queensland University (CQU) enjoy a world class education – many are drawn to northeastern Australia’s unique natural attractions, such as “walkabouts” of the area’s 100 national parks, “fossicking” for precious metals and gems, or snorkeling along the Great Barrier Reef. In just 32 years, Australia’s Central Queensland University (CQU) grew from a single campus in Rockhampton to a multi-campus, national, and international university serving more than 24,000 students. The university takes prides in its diverse and farflung learning environment. One of the keys to maintaining its position as Australia’s fastest-growing university is CQU’s use of advanced information technology (IT) to deliver outstanding educational services to a globally diverse campus network. Yet, the same qualities that make it such a powerful educational force also place tremendous strain on the school’s IT resources.
NEWS & TRENDS
SAP’s Acquisition of Business Objects-- What Does This Mean for Businesses and Customers?
Looking into the Crystal Ball: What is in Store for Asian IT in 2008?
The Evolution of Employee Monitoring 10 Technologies: For Email and Beyond
Compliance — a blessing in disguise!
CHANGE OF GUARD
Louis Corrigan as Chief Technical Officer of Acision
Jonathan Lee as Head of Channels & Alliances integration software and services for SAS Malaysia
Mark Gibbs as President & CEO, SAP North Asia
Yoichiro Yatsurugi as President and CEO of SAP Japan
Lee Yee Shiean as new Regional Product Marketing Manager for 3Com Asia Pacific.
Herbert Leung as Chief Executive Officer of Atos Origin Asia Pacific
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