Big Data and BI: Organizations Hunt Actionable Insights to Improve Business Ops

In the past few years Big Data has grown quickly, from fringe topic to a top concern of CIOs and business leaders. No surprise; organizations of all sizes are drowning in ever-growing pools of data, desperate to put it to good use. Worldwide data production is now estimated at a staggering 1,800 exabytes per year. Little wonder that leveraging Big Data is a major focus of organizations today.

The challenge is like the television show "Hoarders." How do you sift through incredible amounts of materials, figuring out what’s trash and what’s treasure? Many organizations face an even more basic problem: In a recent study one in three executives said they couldn’t find the right people internally with the right data. Clearly something is wrong.
 
(Read my complete white paper at www.slashdotmedia.com)

Parallel Computing Set to Take Center Stage in Europe

Europe is hosting two major parallel computing conferences that provide an exciting forum for industry luminaries to exchange and discuss experiences and new ideas as well as give an overview of new developments in the field.

(Read my entire article on the topic at goparallel.sourceforge)

CSIR Launches Supercomputer to Enter New Research Era

India’s largest research and development organization has announced it is launching a new supercomputer in late July. The machine, which will be the fourth fastest in the country, will usher in a new era of data-intensive scientific discovery for the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) in Bangalore.

(Read my entire article at goparallel.sourceforge)

New Benchmark for Fastest Supercomputer

The way the power and speed of supercomputers are measured is about to change.

A new benchmark will be introduced in November to rank the world’s fastest supercomputers, and will eventually replace the Linpack metric that is currently the basis for the Top500 list.  Called the High Performance Conjugate Gradient (HPCG), the new benchmark is being introduced by Jack Dongarra, distinguished professor of computer science at the University of Tennessee, and the developer of the Linpack system.

(Read my complete article at goparallel.sourceforge)

Spotlight: Consortium offers clound vendor lock-in advice

One of the most difficult issues with cloud platforms is the risk of vendor lock-in, Joe McKendrick notes in ZDNet's Service Oriented blog. He does an excellent job of summarizing the guidelines released by The Open Group on what enterprises should be aware of, and what actions the industry should be taking to achieve greater standardization in the cloud.

(Read my complete blog on the topic at FierceInterpriseCommunications)

IT managers have investment heads in the coulds

IT managers definitely have their heads in the clouds, as cloud computing is reportedly the number one area for IT investment over the next five years. That is the finding of new research by Compuware and Research in Action.

(Read my complete article on the topic at FierceEnterpriseCommunications)

Enterprise communications predictions for 2013--did ON24 get it right?

Like many FierceEnterpriseCommunications readers, I'm a numbers guy, myself. I've done my stint as a research analyst (Aberdeen Group) and a research project manager (Computerworld), so a good survey report or market analysis always gets my attention.

(Read my complete article at FierceEnterpriseCommunications)