Can IT keep up with big data?

Though IT and its functions and responsibilities have changed over the years, there's one area that remains consistent: IT primarily focuses on major enterprise applications and on large machines—whether they are mainframes or super servers.

When IT deals with big data, the primary arena for it is, once again, large servers that are parallel processing in a Hadoop environment. Thankfully for the company at large, IT also focuses on reliability, security, governance, failover, and performance of data and apps—because if it didn't, there would be nobody else internally to do the job that is required. Within this environment, IT's job is most heavily focused on the structured transactions that come in daily from order, manufacturing, purchasing, service, and administrative systems that keep the enterprise running. In this environment, analytics, unstructured data and smaller servers in end user departments are still secondary.

Infotainment upgrade takes center stage with 2017 Land Rover Discovery Sport

In the two years that have progressed since Land Rover launched the Discovery Sport line in the US (replacing the aging LR2), plenty of advancements have been made in terms of in-car technology. Thus, in updating its midsize utility vehicle for 2017, Land Rover's focused nearly entirely on technology.

Encryption: A Matter of Human Rights

Government attacks on the encryption of online communication threaten human rights around the world, warned Amnesty International in a briefing published today as tech giant Apple challenges the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in court over an order to provide software to bypass iPhone encryption.

The briefing, Encryption: A Matter of Human Rights, which is Amnesty International’s first official stance on encryption and human rights, says that people everywhere should be able to encrypt their communications and personal data as an essential protection of their rights to privacy and free speech.

Technology can keep people in touch

This is the fifth in a series about how technology affects child growth and skill development.

Q: What are some positive effects of technology on child growth and skill development?

A: The Washington Post released a survey of teens in 2012 stating they have incorporated social media sites and texting into their daily lives but still prefer face-to-face communication. They believe these social media technologies have enabled them to keep in touch with more friends, to get acquainted with other students at their schools and to connect with students with whom they share interests. One in five stated using social networking helps them feel more popular, confident and sympathetic toward others.

This national study of more than 1,000 youth between 13 and 17 years of age by the child advocacy group Common Sense Media generally contradicts the myth that using social media is harmful because of the risks of bullying by peers, isolation, online predators and the release of private/personal information. However, the report talked about “Facebook fatigue.” Forty-one percent of cellphone users said they are addicted, and 36 percent would like to return to a time before Facebook was invented.

Many teens expressed weariness from the constant pressure from texting and posting on social media. Teens have mixed feelings about digital communication and online technology. Research about the developmental and behavioral effects of technology on youth is scant.

Teens still favor texting in communicating online, with two-thirds stating they text everyday. Facebook is the preferred social site over Twitter, Google and MySpace. More teens think social networking helps their friendships than those who feel it does not — 50 percent vs. 4 percent. Half of all the teen respondents surveyed preferred real-life communication.

Our collective embrace of the Internet, social media sites and mobile-mediated devices is obvious in public places. Most individuals are connected on media to others, not talking to the person or persons with whom they are sitting. Dr. Keith Hampton, a communications professor at the University of Pennsylvania and principal author of the Pew Research study “Social Networking Sites and Our Lives,” articulated concerns about technology and social relationships.

Read More: http://www.hdnews.net/lifestyle/community/technology-can-keep-people-in-touch/article_8fa055a0-f093-5ef4-99b3-bbbca54fd48e.html

Here’s why LTE networks are about to become much more useful

There’s more to LTE than just speeding up communications between mobile devices, and its increasingly faster speeds – now at 150 Mpbs and expected to hit 600 Mpbs by 2018 – is beginning to benefit enterprise networks.

In a recent webinar, 451 Research analyst Christian Renaud noted that many conference attendees are eschewing the free WiFi offered at event facilities in favor of tethering to an LTE network because it’s faster.

“It’s getting far faster and more ubiquitous,” he said. At this rate, the speed of wireless connections will begin to exceed the speed of wired connections in the next few years.

In addition, the worldwide footprint has grown to 422 LTE networks in 143 countries, and all but 12 countries globally have committed to LTE networks, said Renaud. This footprint is now poised to become a platform for innovation and growth in applications as cloud computing, mobility in the workforce, the Internet of Things (IoT) and security have an impact on networks, he said.

Industrial IoT is now becoming a reality, said Renaud, and it means operational technology that historically wasn’t connected to the network is going to be, and it’s going to add further complexity to enterprise networks. Data center and WAN congestion is increasing pressure to offload non-core applications to the cloud, he said, while existing MPLS and private WANs are too “brittle” and interfering with the ability to quickly respond to new applications and services.


Read More: http://www.itworldcanada.com/article/heres-why-lte-networks-are-about-to-become-much-more-useful/378966

Readying Your Data Center for the Internet of Things

As 2015 draws to a close, companies are looking ahead to the New Year and crafting business plans for a successful 2016. As you look to refine your ever-evolving Internet of Things (IoT) strategy, it would be wise to position data center infrastructure at the core of your plan.

As IoT continues to develop, computer systems and communications networks are in overdrive trying to keep up with the demand and scale of all the data that is being generated. In order to meet these increasing infrastructure capacity requirements, a growing number of organizations are moving away from traditional on-premises corporate IT facilities and turning to service providers that deliver data center services such as colocation and cloud computing. In fact, market research firm IDC reports IoT alone will generate the need for 750 percent more data center capacity in service-provider facilities than consumed today.

What Colocation Delivers
For companies that may be new to data center colocation, its benefits range from security to transparency. With colocation, instead of maintaining computing systems in a private data center, an organization houses them in a data center owned and managed by a colocation provider.

The colocation customer organization retains all control over its systems, but the colocation provider manages the data center security, network connections, power, and cooling. In some cases, the colocation provider offers value-added services to customers, such as a data center infrastructure management (DCIM) system that provides additional layers of visibility and control.

One of the top benefits of colocation is scalability. Additional capacity can be brought on quickly, which is a key requirement for fast-growing IoT deployments. Colocation also allows for lower total cost of ownership, meaning organizations can typically maintain their data center operations for much lower total cost than they could build and operate a private data center.

Read More: http://www.iotevolutionworld.com/fog/articles/413555-readying-data-center-the-internet-things.htm