BI and Big Data: A Dark Territory

Business Intelligence, and more specifically Big Data, are hot topics in the industry right now due to the vast potential organizations have to benefit from these capabilities. Two key factors include improving decision making and hopefully discovering new insights from this data. But for many, it can be hard to determine what is needed to build a proper BI solution to meet their needs. On top of that, Big Data can bring even more questions than answers and oftentimes muddy the waters leading to wasted time, effort, and resources when struggling to build an effective BI solution. Read More »

Tips for Those Looking to Work in IT

The roadmap for breaking into IT consists of many routes. The engineer of today can become the CIO of tomorrow. But, keep in mind; career paths can be filled with twists and turns – especially in today’s world where technology is evolving at light speed.

For me, interest in IT started when I began building websites for fun in college. But it wasn’t till after I started working at the computer help desk did I find my true passion for IT. Read More »

Cloud Unified Communications (UC) Services Are Poised for a Breakout Moment

Over the last 13 years, I have seen countless advanced technologies in the telecom world. Networks have gone from ATM and Frame Relay to MPLS and VPLS and even Layer 2 through the years as users demands have evolved.

In voice, we have seen the same advancements, from traditional POTS line to aggressive switch long distance services to Centrex to SIP trunking. Technology continues to advance in the areas of telecom, colocation and now cloud. Similar to the Steve Jobs school of thought of making aesthetically beautiful products that are elegant and easy to use, hosted UC providers are evolving in the same way. Game changing technologies are here to stay and technologies like hosted UC are leading the way, making things simple and providing many benefits. Read More »

Planning – The Foundation of Strategy, Policy and Network

If you don’t have a mobile strategy, you don’t have a future strategy. (Eric Schmidt, Google, Executive Chairman)

Companies have opened their finance purses to mobility in hopes that it can be developed into a business-strengthening plan using time-tested policies already in place. At times this has had negative effects in the attempt to control, or force back, the wave of mobile devices flowing into their networks that are not prepared for the always on wireless connections.

Projections suggest that 72% of the planets 6.9 billion people will be mobile by 2016. (Forester 2012) Read More »

Aggregation Services: The Main Entry Point for IaaS and Public Cloud

Cloud computing is currently the hot topic in IT. At the same time, cloud computing has become one of the most nebulous terms in IT. Even definitions in the cloud space are different from “expert” to “expert.” Consider the cloud computing definitions below from highly credible sources:

Gartner: Cloud computing is a style of computing in which scalable and elastic IT-enabled capabilities are delivered as a service using Internet technologies.

Forester: Cloud computing is a standardized IT capability (services, software or infrastructure) delivered via Internet technologies in a pay-per-use, self-service way.

IDC: Cloud computing is an emerging IT development, deployment and delivery model, enabling real-time delivery of products, services and solutions over the Internet.

Wiki: Cloud computing is the use of computing resources (hardware and software) which are available in a remote location and accessible over a network (typically the Internet). Read More »

Meet the Experts: Jason Brown

We’re starting a new series of posts in which a CDW Solutions Expert will be asked the same five questions. You get to learn more about our Experts and learn their thoughts on IT. The first is Jason Brown a Technical Field Mobility Solutions Architect.

What’s Your Dream Project?

Working on a team that embraces forward looking thinking and a strategy that can include all plan points from one end of the architecture to the other. Read More »

Building The CDW Technoliner

So I get a call from a manager, “ I have a great project for you to work on, West Coast Customs is involved”. Well, being a fan of the show for many years (so many I might show my age), I said “I’m in!”

On the first call I find out I’m working on a bus. But not just any bus, a huge motor 40+ foot coach. When I first saw the rendering it was only the outside and I thought this is going to “wow” a lot of people. But what the heck do we put inside? Read More »

Taking the wraps off of Cisco MDS 16 Gb FC Directors and Switches

We’ve come a long way since the original Cisco MDS line debuted a decade ago. Cisco maintained strong upward and backward compatibility allowing upgrades to a director, replacing line cards and supervisors, taking us from 2 to 4 then 8 Gb FibreChannel (FC) – while preserving the chassis, backplane and power supplies. There have been four generations of line cards to meet the growing demands of datacenters hungry for more bandwidth and throughput. The original operating system (SAN-OS) proved so solid and robust it became the basis of data center networking: Nexus OS (NX-OS) powering Cisco’s current Ethernet and FC networks. Read More »

Data Loss Prevention: It’s Not a Question of “If” but “When”

50 million customer records were stolen from Living Social. Were you one of them? If you’re one of the millions of people that like to look at their daily deals, then you likely were. While credit card information was not stolen or accessed, other personally identifiable information (PII) was. This includes names, email addresses, dates of birth and some encrypted site passwords. Despite the fact that clear text passwords were not stolen, Living Social still emailed their full user database advising them of the breach and encouraged all users to change their passwords. (This created another issue as many spam filters saw these emails as phishing attacks and blocked them from getting to end users’ inboxes.) While Living Social is a consumer site, this breach has far reaching ramifications for all types of businesses. It also raises two important questions:

  1. “What does this mean for my business?”
  2. “Are we protected against a targeted attack or APT like that one?” Read More »