Global Strategy and Business

 

 

 

  Hipster 2020.04 The latest snapshot of OpenIndiana Hipster is 2020.04. It is available in three versions: a live DVD with a graphical installer which installs a full desktop environment; a text installer which is intended for server installations; and a minimal installer which only delivers a minimal set of packages. Each version is available both as a DVD ISO and as a USB image. Please note that the primary mirror is capped so downloads are slower; use regional mirrors instead.  http://dlc-origin.openindiana.org/   Screenshots and wallapers      Downloads, Screenshots, and wallpapers   http://www.openindiana.org https://www.flickr.com/photos/67976888@N06/

OpenIndiana Hipster 2020.04 is here We have released a new OpenIndiana Hipster snapshot 2020.04. The noticeable changes: All remaining OI-specific applications have been ported from Python 2.7 to 3.5, including Caiman (slim_source) installer. Installation images now don’t ship Python 2.7, however some software can still depend on it. GCC 7 is used as the main system compiler now. Libreoffice 6.4 was added. PKG was updated to use rapidjson instead of simplejson for json processing which reduced memory consumption on operations with large package catalogues. A lot of packages were updated. More information can be found in 2020.04 Release notes and new medias can be downloaded from http://dlc.openindiana.org . Categories Announcements , News

Much has been mentioned in the press about about remote location working as a new way to provide a more flexible and productive working environment at a lower cost. Seemlingly this debate was sparked by the current roll out of a new fibre optic back bone and 4G mobile network in the UK. Industry pundits also explore the possiblity that the source of the debate was indeed those telco operators involed. Having helped with the design of home working in major software companies I would say the notion is over hyped.Only identified independent contributors could become productive by remote working.This requires self discipline, may need a restructuring of remuneration, and management cultural shifts. Other large tech giants will point to hot desk savings and real estate costs.Whilst those who do not have suitable working conditions at home may choose not to have remote working thrust upon them.Further surveys suggest employees can become lonely,isolated from innovation and miss out on prom...

There are more issues than those discussed in this article. In the South East where most of the infrastructure investment has taken place there is a shortage of a serviced land bank and even less available for release to the next generation for new Housing stock. The housing industry needs to change and move away from the false premise that there will be another mass  housing boom which will once again increase their land bank book value.The government needs to provide certainty by placing credit controls back to mortgages or loans not exceeding 76.6% of land value for residential property.Prices will re adjust to more sustainable levels outside high demand hotspots.The house builders will fight tooth and nail to influence the politicians to resist this for purely private economic gain. However to stablise the industry and start competitive growth again this will be necessary. The future is the renewal of infrastructure,commercial buildings and...

'Demand by expectation' this may not be a term some can immediately recognize. However the concept stems back to the seventies. 'Demand by expectation is a marketing technique of building expectation and demand from buyers prior to purchase of the product'. In the seventies it was live and well in many of the car companies. Many of whom were benefiting from emerging mass media channels to build brands and loyal followings. In today’s world of multimedia channels the buyer has become more knowledgeable before making the decision to buy. News reports describing mass hysteria, ques outside Apple shops, and fierce determination to purchase a product which the buyer perhaps has never seen. Marketers have been impressed by the apparent defining of this concept by Apple to encourage demand, fix price, and reduce churn. Many critics say Apple encourages unsustainable hyper consumerism to achieve premium earnings for the company created by intelligent marketing and Branding?

The sudden demise of Steve Jobs has touched the hearts of the Apple community all around the world for many personally.However will Apple be Apple with anyone else in charge? The skills Steve Jobs brought to Apple were seen by many as leadership and passion which rubbed off on Apples products and stakeholder groups around the world..A new Chief executive Tim Cook has stepped up to the breach his style transparently different a individual with no recognition by the stakeholder groups but with a professional management agenda.Only time will tell if he succeeds in pushing Apple further.However the question  remains as to whether Apple will perform as well as having a leader who was recognized throughout the world for steering the Apple brand through stormy waters.

The new iPad (3)  is claimed to have a new high-definition screen.display of 2048 x 1536 pixels. The cpu has been ungraded to a new A5X chip with improving graphics performance.The new A5X chip is reported to have up to twice the graphical reproduction of the iPad 2 and Apple calls it "quad-core graphics". The other big feature is support for 4G/LTE, with speeds up to 72Mbps, depending on your network. It will also be 3G-capable and there's a new feature to turn the iPad into a personal hotspot following success of this feature on Android. Many countries in Asia still do not have commercial LTE services as yet. The new Chief executive Tim Cook claims to have "redefined once again the category Apple created". Many question whether if this is enough to hold off the ever improving Android competition snapping at Apples heals.

Public opinion has recently erupted in the UK following the participation of a few UK national companies to use unpaid or forced labour to participate in their businesses. The participation of commercial trading organization in politics has had a very chequered past especially those companies close to public opinion in the retail business. The notion of participation in politics is seen as a strategist as an unwelcome, unknown element in the business which is to be avoid. For those who remember the Benetton’s story tracking the meteoric rise of the business and the meteoric fall of the business following a political, ethical, and social advertising campaign are hurriedly writing an exit strategy. The battles in the press of politics unethical trading at Nike and more recently at Apple have already sounded the alarm bells. The mention of slave labour,child labour, and unethical management actions have made shareholders feel very uneasy. So what are they worried about?Companies dep...

OI Unix Open Enterprise Systems such as Oi UNIX (formally Sun's Opensolaris),Fedora,BSD,and Susie were all destined to create a new low cost sever market in 2011.This has still yet to happen in 2012.BSC Consulting puts forward some suggestions on how the Open source model needs to change to compete with proprietary systems in 2012.Arguing that Open source needs to deliver the same product experience as proprietary systems whilst defining Open source processes as the customer choice. The notion that the Open source route is sheltered from a customer focus is clearly untrue. Theoretically Open source should be the preferred product in recessionary times been relatively less effected by the economic cycle.Urging a change from a developer dominant community to a wider community skills base with defined traits.Producing a defined strategy to develop and dominate a market segment.Building  business professionals within the business or community.Use professional marketeers to innova...

The business man who helped Apple to challenge the personal computing, mobile device and music industries status quo has died. Apple's co-founder Steve Jobs died aged 56 in California. Fans and employees gathered at the Apple campus in Cupertino California to remember him. Steve jobs will always be remembered as the co-founder of Apple Mac and took the opportunity of setting a niche strategy around the products to differentiate his offerings with design innovation and usability. Open source communities also attribute him for promoting their designs and software to the wider world. The range of products revolutionized consumer computing design with the help of English designers and challenged the dominance of Microsoft in the personal computing market. He also challenged the music industry to reinvent itself online. Towards the end of his career he saw Google Open source vendor as his chief competitor.Much criticism was published in the press in this battle against Google. Battli...

The Competition Commission (CC) the independent public body which conducts inquiries into mergers, and competition announced on Wednesday a reiteration of its ruling for Spanish-owned airports operator BAA to sell two more airports which may include London Stansted. BAA has two years to divest further assets.London Gatwick has already been sold out of the group but. Stansted,Edinburgh or Glasgow airports are under the spotlight which form part of the Spanish Group Ferrovial in 2006.It was hoped sale of Gatwick to US investment fund Global Infrastructure Partners for 1.51 billion pounds in late 2009 would stave off the further sale of its UK assets.The sale of terminal five at Heathrow to a third party was resisted. This comes soon after the public condemnation of the way it handled flights out of the Heathrow at Christmas 2010. http://www.competition-commission.org.uk/

Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne has announced a total of 21 Enterprise Zones throughout the UK as a strategy to create jobs.Businesses operating in these zones will be able to claim 100 per cent discounts on high speed broadband through the tax system.The London Mayor Boris Johnson will be tasked to identify where in capital enterprise zones will be established.It is thought to follow areas of high unemployment or areas effected by high public sector job losses. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors have initially responded with the following statement. "It is not clear how effective new enterprise zones will be in stimulating long term sustainable development beyond an initial boost. While the tax breaks and changes to planning restrictions may draw short term investment into an area they also have a number of downsides. The total cost to Government can be expensive and there often needs to be other public investment in areas such as transport inf...

IT Pro  have reported certain IT security breaches which link Iran to attacks aimed at sites run by tech giants including Microsoft and Google. “Countries in North Africa and the Gulf region are facing popular protests and many commentators have identified the internet and in particular social networking sites as a major organising tool for the protests.” Cyber attacks are ongoing issues for large corporations as they achieve global reach many of which are reported to be politically motivated.

One major problem with using Opensolaris was the lack of drivers for mobile 3G modems However with the development of tethering on Android (Froyo 2.2 and above) Openindiana can now been used very easily with laptops on the 3G/4G networks. In Android go to settings,wireless networks,check the boxes marked tethering and mobile networks.This will create a mobile hotspot from your Android Phone. In OI go to the network section at the top right of the screen and manually select the HTC network in this case.You may have to wait a few seconds for it to configure. A notification will show at the top of your screen to show you are connected to the 3 G network via your Android phone.

Open source and cloud computing are all in the tech news these days in a bid to convince us to go into the cloud.Cloud.com lauches a product presentation of their new offering http://open.cloud.com

Sun first muted offering services via the cloud two years ago but what has changed? Leading proprietory system providers all have announced plans to offer services in the cloud over the next few years.The main focus of offerings are likely to be aimed at small to mid sized business with an economy price tag.Traditionally arguments against purchasing cloud services have bee fueled by vendor lockins,security,and lack of high speed bandwith. BSC consulting argues that Opensource is best placed to develop cloud services at reasonable cost over propitiatory software vendors.

Intel announces a new atom processor to compete in the mobile market.Uk company ARM is currently the market leader in the design of mobile chip architecture. Intel has bolstered its hopes by looking at placing the Atom in forthcoming mobile tablets.