Archive for the ‘connectivity’ Category

As the common denominator behind surging interest in cloud software, social networks and mobile shopping are the likes of smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices, it is little wonder mobility tops the chat charts when it comes to business technology.

“When you ponder all the different trends driving technology decisions, the common denominator comes down to this question: Does the technology you are considering enable you and your team to get the job done job from any place, at any time, no matter which computing device they happen to have at hand?,” said Heather Clancy on znet.com.

Are we witnessing the demise of the desktop and laptop?

John Herlihy, Google’s VP of online sales, believes that the desktop has about three years before phones replace it. And he first made that prediction a year ago.

Previously, only those with BlackBerrys used phones for everything, including simple tasks such as email. Now, according to a new Nielsen smartphone report, 43% of mobile phone users have smartphones. People use phones to do things that used to be reserved for desktop PCs, such as surf the web, play games, and watch video.

By Cecilia Kang, The Washington Post

The thousands of devices debuting at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas demonstrate how tech companies are poised to gather unprecedented insights into consumers’ lives — how much they eat, whether they exercise, when they are home and who they count as friends.

Silicon Valley is in a gold rush for information, highlighted by Google’s announcement that it would incorporate data posted by users on its social networking service into the results of its main search engine.

Efforts to shift the internet to a new addressing system have been boosted by US internet service provider Comcast.

The firm has begun switching some customers over to a system built around the net’s new addressing scheme, called IP Version 6 (IPv6).

The change is needed because the older version has almost exhausted its pool of available addresses.

Some small UK ISPs have also begun putting domestic customers on a network that uses the new system.

Chip manufacturer Intel has announced it is to roll out a new technology for connecting computers and peripherals.

The system, known as Thunderbolt, promises transfer speeds twice as fast as USB 3.0.

However it won’t reach its theoretical maximum because Intel has opted to use copper wires rather than fibre optic cables.

The company said it would gradually move to higher speeds over time.

Apple will become the first manufacturer to use Thunderbolt, on its Macbook Pro computers.

The Cupertino firm is said to have been a major driver of its development, although it remains to be seen how may other manufacturers will adopt the new standard.