Weekly Download 14.7
Posted: May 19, 2014 Filed under: Business, Change, Technology, Weekly Download | Tags: Accenture, Christine Comaford, digital decade, Forbes, McKinsey & Company Leave a comment
Here’s a recap of news and notes from around the Web that caught my attention over the past week or so.
An oldie but a goodie. How Change Fails: CEOs Focus On Symptoms NOT The System. Click “next post” on the right of the screen for more from Forbes.com contributor Christine Comaford. Good stuff.
Accenture’s take on the digital decade. A summary of twelve truths and a closer look at truth #4.
McKinsey & Company looks at Ten IT-enabled business trends for the decade ahead.
- Social
- Big data
- Internet of things
- Anything as a service
- Automating knowledge work
- Global digital citizens
- When digital and physical worlds collide
- Personalization and simplification
- Digital commerce
- Transforming government, healthcare and education
Partly Sunny or Partly Cloudy?
Posted: May 16, 2014 Filed under: Technology | Tags: cloud, Microsoft Exchange Online Leave a commentWhen the Cloud Disappoints
I’m trying to execute a cloud-first strategy. Moving to Microsoft’s Exchange Online seemed like an obvious and relatively safe choice for migrating a major production application (email) to the cloud. Well, it didn’t turn out that way, and I feel like we averted a significant issue. We have now “de-clouded” our email.
Why? Come to find out, currently Microsoft only has a service level based on WEB ONLY ACCESS to the Exchange on-line platform. Those who need to use Outlook (via Outlook Anywhere) or Mobile/Tablet access (via ActiveSync) don’t have any service level guarantees. We experienced significant outages and the error messages created confusion – even among the I.T. team. Therefore, we have chosen to not proceed.
This feels very strange and awkward. How can this be? What could we have done differently? How are others not feeling the same pain? Have we done something incorrectly? Many questions remain unanswered despite our discussions with Microsoft. I’m guessing this won’t be our last “partly cloudy” experience either. All the while I remain committed to the direction and making good choices and learning. We’ll continue on the journey and work our way towards “partly sunny.”
Photo by Mark Baker
Happy 25th! Happy 50th!
Posted: May 14, 2014 Filed under: Technology | Tags: ARPANET, CERN, Tim Berners-Lee, World Wide Web Leave a comment
Image courtesy of mrsiraphol / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
The World Wide Web has been around for 50% of my years. Yes, happy 50th birthday to me as the Web turns 25. How crazy is that thought?
Let me digress and explain the difference between the Internet and the World Wide Web. In 1969, ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network) was launched to facilitate communications between military installations. The infrastructure consisted of mainframe computers at major universities around the country and included both the hardware and software components. This “network of networks” is the Internet.
In a separate initiative, British scientist Tim Berners-Lee wanted a system to connect scientists at universities and institutes throughout the world. He developed a method for transmitting data across the Internet via browsing and hypertext links between nodes of information. Thus, the World Wide Web was launched in 1989 with the first website at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research). It later became available to the public in 1993.
Berners-Lee’s original proposal is a fascinating read. His describes his initial goal as looking for a future-proof system that is: “portable, or supported on many platforms” and “extendible to new data formats.” To say that he met this goal would be a gross understatement. He also says, “I imagine that two people for 6 to 12 months would be sufficient for this phase of the project.” That calls to mind the Margaret Mitchell quote, “”Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful people could change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
Happy birthday, World Wide Web. Here’s to many more.
ZMAB15 