Name THE place and THE species people must see in their lifetime

Our one and only planet has so many fantastic places and species that we're almost spoilt for choice.

And even though that choice is getting smaller...

...or in some cases the choices are disappearing (or more commonly referred to as going extinct)...

...there's still so much out there that stands out on this planet as amazing, astounding, and downright breathtaking...

So how do you Choose?
There's so much out there, how could you possibly choose 1 place and 1 species to recommend to someone else?

How about using these criteria:


1. What you are seeing makes your bottom jaw suddenly go slack and descend from your upper jaw by a couple of centimetres.
2. Your breath suddenly gets shorter.
3. There may be a camera in your hand but you also know that pictures alone are never even going to begin to convey the majesty of what' you're seeing with your own eyes...

The New Revolution: Open Source in the Enterprise

Open source technologies can be traced back to the late 1970s when Richard Stallman, a former programmer at MIT A1 Laboratories, launched the GNU Project and Free Software Foundation. The ultimate goal of the GNU project was to produce a free operating system. Since then there has been some significant GNU projects such as Apache (a www Server), Perl (interpreted program language) Mozilla (a www browser) and Linux open source operating systems supported by companies such as Redhat Corporation.

Today’s commercial information system architectures are complex in nature with many commercial vendors providing solutions in the areas of document management, company intranet portals, knowledge management, incident tracking, business intelligent reporting just to name a few. In many of these cases, you will be able to find open source equivalents that provide similar functionality.

There is several advantages in using open source solutions, these can be categorised into two major benefits (1) cost advantages (2) operational and functional advantages. Open source solutions to a large extent do not possess any significant license implications however you would be utilising a subscription based costing model thereby reducing upfront costs. From a operational and functional aspect these solutions are based on the LAMP application stack (Linux Apache MySQL and PHP) which are proven and stable/reliable platforms. Secondly, if an organisation is satisfied with the functionality of the open source solution, the upgrade path is determined by the organisation and not pushed by a third party vendor organisation. In most cases, the upgrade of commercial information system solutions is a expensive and taxing exercise which most small to medium (SME) business do not possess the time or money to undertake.

Over the last few years, there has been some key acquisitions of open source companies, including Sun Microsystems purchase of MySQL for a USD $1 Billion, Yahoo’s acquisition of Zimbra for USD $350 Million, Microsoft’s purchase of SpringSource for an undisclosed amount and Oracle Corporation’s purchase of Sleepycat. This trend is supported by a leading consultancy organisations Gartner who predict that by 2012, 80 percent of all commercial software will include elements of open source technology. Gartner conclude by saying that “Many open sourced technologies are mature, stable and well supported. They provide significant opportunities for vendors and users to lower their total cost of ownership and increase returns on investment” (http://news.cnet.com/8301-13505_3-9863802-16.html).

Traditionally, one of the key barrier to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) adopting open source technology solutions has been due to the lack of support in implementing open source solutions. However, there are now many organisations which assist companies to translate their information technology landscape to utilise open source technology solutions. Open source technology solutions have also matured significantly during the last few years and can comfortably provide an effective alternative to commercial applications.

Open source technologies are particularly useful for companies that are seeking to re-structure their business processing. The advent of the internet has triggered the commercial market place for many companies to be global. Many SME’s are finding that with along with their global marketing exposure, certain business processes such as inventory management, product cataloguing accounting practices and logistics all require process improvement to compete in a competitive market. Open source solutions such as SugarCRM (open source customer relationship management application), OpenPro Inventory management software, and SQL Ledger (an double entry Enterprise Resource Planning software) provide solutions to improve these processes.

Any SME wishing to incorporate open-source technologies into their information system landscape should seek and partner with an open source solution vendor who can assist them in their open source journey.

Microsoft Tech·Ed SEA 2008 - Early Bird Promotion

Tech.Ed SEA, Microsoft’s premier and largest annual conference, is back with full force! Invite your customers to attend! This is the opportunity to experience and realize the full potential not only of the technology, but of their own! Early bird offer : Register before April 30, 2008 and save more than 45% on registration fee! To find out more, go to http://www.microsoft.com/malaysia/techedsea2008/

Microsoft Searches Jump 15% After Live Cashback Launch

This isn’t enough data to declare Microsoft’s much derided Live Cashback search product a winner, but the first full month after it launched (June) shows a 15% gain in search volume v. the previous month, according to Comscore. This erases the previous month’s losses, bringing Microsoft up to 9.2% overall search share.

Live Search CashBack gives advertisers the option of offering users a direct rebate for purchases made after searching on Microsoft. The product shifts search advertising from cost-per-click (CPC) to cost-per-action (CPA) and give a lot of the revenue back to users.

Live Search Cashback isn’t designed to grab a ton of market share away from Google and Yahoo, but Microsoft is hopeful that more users will come to them when doing searches around buying goods online. And those queries tend to bring in the lion’s share of advertising dollars

Web 2.0 developers rank MSN/Live higher than Google, Yahoo and Facebook

Web 2.0 software developers ranked Microsoft's MSN/Live Windows developer program higher than competing programs offered by Internet leaders Google, Yahoo, Amazon, eBay, Facebook and PayPal, according to results of an Evans Data Corp. report released today.

The "Users' Choice: Web 2.0 Developer Programs" report is based on the results of a survey of more than 400 developers, who rated developer programs from the seven companies in 13 categories, including API functionality, blogs, marketing assistance tools/SDKs, Web services, documentation, support and forums. The Google Inc. and Yahoo Inc. programs were ranked right after Microsoft Corp.'s. While the recent opening of Facebook's development platform has garnered lots of attention for the social network, it ranked next to last among the seven Web 2.0 development programs included in the survey. Amazon.com Inc. and eBay Inc. also ranked higher than Facebook, with all of them ahead of last place PayPal Inc.

Microsoft scored high in user satisfaction for its Web services, software development kits, documentation and forums. In the Web services category, Microsoft came in on top this year after ranking last in the year-earlier survey.

"As Microsoft moved from the relatively closed-in MSN portal to the more Web 2.0 savvy Windows Live collection of services, users have begun to recognize it as a provider of top-notch Web services," according to the survey.

Google ranked second among the surveyed developers by scoring high on API functionality, available marketing assistance for Web 2.0, a solutions directory and options for ongoing communications like RSS. Yahoo ranked third in overall developer programs, dropping from its second-place finish in last year's Evans survey. The researcher said that Yahoo benefited from what users called strong technical resources. EBay dropped from third to fourth place in this year's ranking, with lower grades for its Web services program. The online auctioneer did get strong marks for the functionality of its APIs, marketing assistance, forums and SDKs. Facebook ranked sixth out of the seven developer programs in its first year in the survey. The most highly ranked feature of the Facebook program is the functionality of its APIs.

"While the company's API functionality is rated very high by developers (placing third among the field of seven), Facebook lacks the support resources to help developers," the study said. "Facebook fares poorly among users of its APIs for the available documentation, marketing assistance and ongoing communications. While there is tremendous interest in the Facebook social networking platform, Facebook still has not capitalized on the buzz by providing the supporting information to continue driving developer interest."

The report went on to note that Microsoft and Google allow users to profit the most from the applications they develop, through their integration capabilities and lack of downtime. According to Evans, 26% of developers using Microsoft's MSN/Live programs said they have generated "significant" profits from it, while 23% said the same for PayPal, 15% for Amazon, 13% for Google and 10% for Facebook. Meanwhile, 38% of developers said they had not benefited financially from using eBay's developer program, while 36% said the same for Yahoo, 33% for Amazon, 27% for Google , 20% for PayPal and 9% for Microsoft.

Developers say they have had the most difficulty integrating their applications using the Facebook technologies -- 77% said they had experienced at least some degree of difficulty integrating Facebook technologies with their apps. Facebook was followed by eBay and Yahoo as the hardest to integrate. Only 40% of developers said that Amazon technologies are difficult to integrate, while 45% said the same of Google. The companies that developers said offer the strongest integration capabilities are Microsoft, Amazon and Google.

New Memory Capacity on Cisco 2600XM Series Multiservice Router

Two new features are being introduced on all Cisco® 2600XM Series multiservice routers. The first is a new 128-MB synchronous dynamic RAM (SDRAM) dual in-line memory module (DIMM) for use in all new and existing Cisco 2600XM Series multiservice routers. This new 128-MB DIMM offers higher-density memory, providing the ability to support memory increases to 256 MB of DRAM (with the correct ROM monitor [ROMmon]). All Cisco 2650XM Multiservice Router, Cisco 2651XM Multiservice Router, and Cisco 2600XM bundles and upgrades to 128 MB of DRAM are now shipping with one 128-MB SDRAM DIMM instead of two 64-MB SDRAM DIMMs. This allows for the second slot to remain open for future memory expansion up to 256 MB.

The second announcement is a new internal ROMmon on all Cisco 2600XM Series multiservice routers. This new ROMmon simply provides the "future ability" to upgrade the Cisco 2600XM Series to 256-MB DRAM. Currently the maximum memory used by Cisco IOS® Software is 128 MB. Some future Cisco IOS Software releases will use more than 128 MB of memory and will require this new ROMmon support to provide access to memory between 128 MB and 256 MB. Cisco IOS Software usage of more than 128 MB of SDRAM (in specific software images) is scheduled for October 2004 or sooner.

Changes are being made to address the following:

• Support for up to 256 MB of DRAM for future memory increases past Cisco IOS Software Release 12.3 Mainline

• Memory scalability for greater feature and service enhancements in Cisco IOS Software releases 12.4T and 12.5M

• Ability for customers to maximize memory capacity for future growth, without adding future service costs for adding memory at a later date.

• Commitment to Cisco 2600XM Series longevity

Cisco New Routers - Everything but the Kitchen Sink

It seems everyone is talking about Cisco’s new routers that were launched todayI just got off a phone briefing with Cisco to discuss their new routers.

Essentially, today Cisco introduced what they are terming the new "Cisco Integrated Services Router Portfolio". The basic aim of the new line of routers is “our goal is an integrated systems approach to embedded services speeds IP communications deployments, while reducing operating costs and complexity.”

It’s a Router, it’s an IP-PBX, and it’s Voicemail All Rolled In One…
The new router line features secure voice, call processing, voicemail, auto attendant, voice trunks, transcoding, and conferencing – all in one integrated platform. Cisco has thrown everthing but the kitchen sink into their new routers!

Indeed they have embedded and integrated functionality for deployment flexibility, including motherboard digital signal processing slots for voice/fax modules, Cisco CallManager Express call processing, Cisco Unity Express voicemail and auto attendant, voice module for increased analog & BRI densities, as well as voice signaling encryption via embedded Virtual Private Network (VPN) hardware. They’ve also added DSP flexibility by letter customers choose the number of DSPs they need. In addition, it now has support for the Cisco Communicator and the cool Cisco 7970 Color Phone, as seen here:




Further, I have learned that Cisco is preparing Linux-based cards to go with the new routers, allowing them to run applications not based on the company's Internetwork Operating System (IOS). To power all of this “included” functionality, Cisco has definitely added some “punch” to their new router line. The new line has 5X better voice density, 7X performance, and 4X memory - all while bringing down the price point to compete with Juniper Networks which recently acquired Netscreen Technologies. But here’s the key difference - while Juniper Networks does a good job of integrating firewall, VPN, intrusion detection, anti-virus, and other security mechanisms, there is one thing sorely lacking. Take a wild guess…. they’re lacking VoIP support. That’s a big piece of the puzzle that Cisco has neatly integrated into their product line. I for one cannot think of a single major router company other than Cisco that has advanced VoIP support!


Take a look at Cisco Call Manager Express v2.0 features which is installed on these new routers and enabled via license keys. It comes in two flavors:
Advanced Integration Module

•14 hours of voice message storage (beginning with Release 2.0)

•Up to 4 simultaneous sessions/ports

•Shipping since April 2004

•Supported on Cisco 2801, 2811, 2821, 2851 and 2691, 2600XM, 3700

•Lower entry platform and price point