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Gartner Reveals Top 10 Technologies For Next 4 Years
Dr. Jim writes "The good folks over at the Gartner Group have revealed the top 10 technologies that they believe will change the world over the next four years. The usual suspects including multi-core chips, virtualization, and cloud computing are on the list. Multicore servers and virtualization will mean that firms will need fewer boxes, and apps can be easily moved from box to box (and right out the door to an outsourced data center). Workplace social networks and cloud computing means that the need for a centralized IT department will go away. Firms will no longer need to own/maintain the boxes that they use to run their firm's apps. With no need to touch a box, there will be no need to have the IT staff co-located with the boxes."
What security?
Physics is nothing like religion. If it was, we'd have an easier time trying to raise money!
The article summary quotes a blog posting, *NOT* the Gartner study. Further, the blog posting only quotes the top ten items from Gartner, and provides no further data.
The blogger is passing around FUD, without supporting those statements with any information from Gartner. This is a non-article with so little data.
'Duh'. Multicore processing? Are you fucking kidding me? You have to go out of your way to buy a computer that doesn't have multiple cores. Hybrid core? Wouldn't that be covered with the video cards opening up and letting generic code run on their processors? The rest are completely obvious in the same way. Anyone who's been watching computers for the past year could have compiled that list.
"Firms will no longer need to own/maintain the boxes that they use to run their firm's apps. With no need to touch a box, there will be no need to have the IT staff co-located with the boxes."
...and in further news: Rocks, Paper, Scissors poised for a comeback as non-IT personal try to establish who it is that has travel half way across the continent to push the "on" button.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
If you make your predictions vague enough, they have a good chance of being correct (for generous interpretations of correct).
I predict the next 4 years in technology is going to be similar to this year. This will end up being correct for generous definitions of "similar".
1. Multicore and hybrid processors
2. Virtualization and fabric computing
3. Social networks and social software
4. Cloud computing and cloud/Web platforms
5. Web mashups
6. User Interface
7. Ubiquitous computing
8. Contextual computing
9. Augmented reality
10. Semantics
Workplace social networks and cloud computing means that the need for a centralized IT department will go away.
But borne from the ashes of the 'centralized IT department' come the 'social networking support department'. Because no matter how intuitive you make it, someone won't get it. That fact, combined with the problem that the larger your corporation becomes, the more obfuscated every little thing is (I work for GE).
Informatus Technologicus
Anyone remember the guy who's TiVo started recording a lot of gay movies? "My TiVo thinks I'm gay!"
There is a lot of room to make big mistakes in this area of computing. Contextual Computing can lead to hilarious failures.
While the article and summary want to scare IT workers ("Oh, oh -- can you hear your job going away?"), perhaps it's time to get back to the big picture: Information Technology is supposed to help people do their jobs more efficiently. So, while the article does much to suggest that server-side stuff might be getting "outsourced" to the cloud, people still need to interface with it. It'd be nice to see client systems taking steps forward in terms of reliability and ease of use, but nothing monumental is changing on that side of the equation.
But, by outsourcing/concentrating the server-side administration to the "cloud", you might free up IT workers to do less grunt work and do more in terms of process innovations, making the whole enterprise more efficient. IT workers will have to think about how they can make the business operate more efficiently, and be creative and get it implemented. Are today's IT workers ready for that level of thinking?
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Hey code monkey... learn electronics!
Cloud computing is already here, Valve invented it this morning!
On another note, an unknown company is bringing out a sewing application that promises to push multithreading to it's limits.
+1 IDisagreeSoHeMustBeATrollOrAnAstroturferOrAShill
No later than when companies notice that suddenly, surprisingly someone patents something they were on the verge of patenting themselves, when they notice that said company is somehow curiously located where their servers are.
I guess even our business captains know that putting information into hands you can't control is a BAD idea. They should know. They've been gathering ours for years, and they know what value even trivial information (like your shopping habits) has.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Quote mining for the win! "In the C-blox world, a truck drops off a data center container and then picks it up again in a few years when Microsoft is ready to switch over to new hardware. Administrators will only enter the physical C-blox in the rarest of occasions. "In that sense, your IT workers look more like truckers and longshoremen than traditional IT workers," Manos said. It will also allow Microsoft to run the entire Northlake facility with a continuous staff of little more than 20 or 30 employees."
Client: I can't login.
Troubleshooting Step #1: Make sure it's plugged in.
Ergo, there will always be a need for IT staff co-located with the boxes.
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
Some/most of these things exist already, some of them are in use and relevant. Others are just excuses for avoiding work.
I'll see your Constitution and raise you a Queen.
Cloud computing doesn't make centralized IT go away.
Amazon EC2 only provides you with servers. You still need system admins to configure and run and debug the boxes if you're doing anything remotely complicated.
It does solve provisioning issues, procurement issues and lights-out management. But that is just a sliver of centralized IT.
And having Amazon provide "remote hands" for you to replace failed hardware is not even a "centralized" part of IT. Even without cloud computing you shouldn't have your IT organization tightly coupled to where your sites are. All that you need is the occasional physical hardware replacement, and management of the facilities (power, cooling, etc).
"Firms will no longer need to own/maintain the boxes that they use to run their firm's apps. With no need to touch a box, there will be no need to have the IT staff co-located with the boxes."
How do you access the "cloud" without a computer next to you?
You have DSL embedded in your brain?
Get a clue. Companies may not have conventional desktop PCs in their offices, but they're going to have to have SOME sort of computing device - if nothing but a thin client or even just a flat screen terminal or a BlackBerry - to access the computing resources.
And those devices need servicing - if not much servicing.
Anybody who thinks computers are leaving offices is so frickin' deluded I don't know what to say.
Not to mention that your IT staff exists mostly to solve the problems with the SOFTWARE - not the hardware. And software problems aren't going away regardless of whether it's on the desk, on a server, or in the cloud.
Who deals with those problems may change. Companies may very well outsource their IT support - I am the outsource for my clients - but all that means is they'll pay more for less (except in my case, 'cause I'm cheap.) Their overall cost may go down, but in many cases they'll get poorer service because the IT staff servicing their problems isn't a member of the company or on site and thus has less comprehension of the company's needs. There's nothing like being on site and in daily contact with the staff to see what a company's problems are.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
http://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=681107 "Gartner Identifies Top Ten Disruptive Technologies for 2008 to 2012"
back in 2002 it was called web services, then it was web 2.0 and a few other things. the 2008 name is cloud computing. come early 2009 they will make up another name to hype at the conventions and get eyeballs to tech news websites
Not only that, and you do make a hugely valid point, but all this IT infrastructure is ... well, it would grind office productivity to a halt if the printer is broken. Despite all the hardware, the paperless office has not yet taken off in any meaningful way. When the connection between your desktop and the printer is through a router that is on the other side of the country, and it takes 2 hours to get it working, productivity will drop significantly. To simply bleat on about moving the data center out into the cloud is blindly spewing PR like the run up to the invasion of Iraq.
Much like outsourcing has come to be more expensive, so too will 'outsourcing' your data center. I'm sure that we've all heard of DDoS attacks. How convenient will they become when your data is on the other side of a router from your workers? Yeah, the SLAs sound good on paper, but oat 4:30 on a Friday of a long weekend, when your billing processes grind to a halt, how long will it take to get fixed? My personal favorite is the data center people telling me it is an application error. The billing department is telling me that their application is giving an error that a server can't be found. My code says that there is a permission problem on a network directory, and no one left in the data center has admin rights on that box.
Yep, this outsourcing thing will work out well.
What was that old saying? If you want it done right, you have to do it yourself? Sometimes it is true, ya know?
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Once again those who "live and breathe" technology attempt to predict how technology will affect the average worker who "doesn't get" the basics of technology or care about it.
... and creating engaging content. NOT DESCRIBING SOME TECHNICAL ISSUE TO SOME "CLOUD BASED SUPPORT GEEK IN THE NEXT TIME-ZONE".
... and yes students are tech savvy - but tech savvy at using applications and devices does not give you the deductive skill needed to solve problems.
I support over 180 teaching staff and 30 administrative staff + 2000 HS students using about 700 computers.
Many of the staff are quite comfortable users - but 98% of them have their real job focus "teaching students". Yes they use technology but their focus is staying abreast of new trends in Math - science - History
Local support will not go away for a long time
Its not the years, its the mileage
At #7 they have "user interface" listed like it's some technology you can buy. Same with "semantics" at #10.
Some poor IT guy is going to have a lot of complicated explaining to do when the CIO pounds his fist on his desk and yells "go get us some user interface and semantics!"
Bingo! That's more correct than most IT managers would ever realize. Outsourcing is just that; too expensive and even more work than to keep it in-house. I've personally seen two, local, big corp data centers get sucked into the "let's let do this and save on our expensive in-house help!" Worked out great in both situations. One company scared off any good talent and got a name around the area as a lame data center to work for, plus they're paying through the nose for their administration now! They were not much to begin with anyway. The other Big Retail Co. got a sad and unpleasant shock when the "solutions provider" couldn't live up to their marketing hype; "we can build you a cluster of servers in about a hour" turned out to be "well, when you give us a month's notice and take the bundled software we provide at the revisions only we approve and support, then after that it's about an hour. Oh, and you can't upgrade any software to what you need." They did a big about face in just two year's time and recently hired back one of their admins at about a 150% salary! He just bailed for an even greener pasture. Now they're on Dice searching and hoping. It does not pay to outsource, then decide against it and hope you can find some hungry admins of high quality who don't already know what kind of crap your management pulls. Good luck with that. Seriously.
Also, I might add that outsourcing critical data is *NOT*, repeat *NOT*, going into the cloud, or over to India. There are huge obstacles to having your (health care or SOX-type, or government contract with employee info, etc.) data stored in someplace other than in your own, well-protected, data center her in the USA. It's not going to happen as there are several federal regulations that make it impossible, or really really not worth it for a number of legal reasons. That's not changing in the next four years.
This is the NSA, we're gonna geet U h@x0r5! Also, what is a h@x0r5?
IT workers will have to think about how they can make the business operate more efficiently, and be creative and get it implemented.
Puh-lease. Today's IT workers can't get our users to access network file shares rather than filling the mail spool with the same attachments (And a million revisions thereof) over and over and over... And in the few cases I've seen where people (always at least "engineers", not just your typical office staff) do use a NAS, they constantly come asking for help when they try to send outside contacts links to internal files. It seems that people have some sort of mental wall around the ideas of "local" and "not local", with no middle-ground possible. And god forbid you actually make such access secure - Users will actually burn CDs and pass them back and forth rather than even attempt to navigate the simplest of login prompts.
So no, I don't worry about finding myself unneeded any time soon - Regardless of how easy the technology gets to use, the actual users still won't get it. And they'll need us to help them get that 10.1MB file (that the email system keeps rejecting) to Fred in Accounting - Who will then need our help opening the file.
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Check out my sysadmin blog!
as always : out-sourcing or off-shoring ? Our IT department consists of only a couple of in-house people, the rest is out-sourced. However, these out-sourced people are always on-site, so this does nor make a difference in head count, only in bookkeeping strategy.