Clive Longbottom on IT-Analysis.com

UK's CRC - from a diamond in the rough to a dirty tax

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 12:39:31 +0100

When the previous government brought through the carbon reduction commitment (CRC) scheme, it seemed to have promise, although it was flawed in certain areas. The idea was that a body be set up to... [Read More...]

IDF 2010: More of the same, plus hidden gems

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 15:30:14 +0100

I've just returned from Intel's Developer Forum in San Francisco. I went expecting some big noises over next generation IP-based television-cum-other media-cum-internet enabled systems... [Read More...]

Process abstraction - a step nearer?

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 13:38:14 +0100

If you take a look at your business, you'll see that it is run by processes. The problem is that these processes are not neatly packaged up under a single application - they are spread... [Read More...]

Cloudsourcing - trust, contracts and speed

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 13:40:02 +0100

As cloud evolves, there will need to be some fairly fundamental changes in how things are done. If all that cloud manages to do is to shift the platform focus from the corporate data centre to an... [Read More...]

A gift from IT to the business

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 16:05:23 +0100

It is not just UK plc that needs to balance its books. Many businesses face the same challenge as the country slowly recovers from recession. The upturn should lead to an increase in sales for many... [Read More...]

Dealing with austerity - ensuring the best bang per buck

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 10:12:26 +0100

The recessionary tide may have gone out for the moment, albeit by inches rather than yards, but the detritus of flotsam and jetsam that it has left behind is not a pretty site. From whole countries... [Read More...]

What's the future for G-Cloud?

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 15:56:33 +0100

In July 2008, the government launched the Operational Efficiency Programme (OEP), looking at where savings could be made in the UK's central government operations. Dr Martin Read was tasked... [Read More...]

Mixing water and electricity - Cool!

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 06:38:33 +0100

When presenting on how to build a modern data centre, I generally point to the fact that a data centre should be built for the machines, not for the humans, and an air temperature of around 26-27... [Read More...]

Enterprise performance management - the story continues...

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 09:04:07 +0100

Quocirca has completed the second cycle of research and analysis for Oracle around enterprise performance management (EPM), and the headline results show a massive improvement across the six... [Read More...]

Making a pain go away

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 05:28:18 +0100

Up front, I apologise. I am about to write a couple of words that are likely to make the general reader's eyes glaze over. Bear with me - and I hope that the end result is a bit more... [Read More...]

Lotusphere 2010 - consolidation, and setting the future scene

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 17:02:48 +0100

At Lotusphere this year, there was little in the way of rip-roaring, rousing announcements that could knock the socks off someone who was sitting there wondering what Lotus would do for their... [Read More...]

Plan for carbon trading - or pay the price

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 12:39:17 +0100

For some time now, those organisations deemed to fit into the high energy intensive space, such as mining and refining, have had to adhere to laws around setting and achieving energy... [Read More...]

Dreamforce 09: salesforce.com still on cloud nine

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 15:36:58 +0100

So, salesforce.com's yearly fest of force-feeding the loyal - Dreamforce 09 - has come to an end. What can we take away from what was talked about, shown and supported by the many... [Read More...]

Boiling the wrong ocean for a Smarter Planet?

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 11:58:28 +0100

IBM's new focus is on the smarter planet - using technology to make the planet a better place. While Quocirca has no problems with this at a high level, it does have some... [Read More...]

Managed authentication services in the Cloud

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 07:00:00 +0100

Managing strong authentication systems in house can be expensive and problematic. The emergence of cloud-based services offers a more effective means of providing such important services [Read More...]

VMware sees clouds in Hotel California

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 10:56:15 +0100

At VMworld in California this week, the topic de jour was, unsurprisingly, cloud computing. VMware wants to be the underpinning to internal and external clouds, using the capabilities of its growing... [Read More...]

Is the IT turnaround just around the corner?

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 11:05:32 +0100

The largest, deepest, longest recession in history looks like it was overblown - Germany and France are already out of recession, and it is likely that the UK will follow soon -... [Read More...]

Digital Cities - An evolutionary cul-de-sac?

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 14:38:58 +0100

Governments and vendors alike seem to be rushing to build new cities, or retro-fit old ones to be new digital cities, with the latest and greatest super-fast connectivity, communication... [Read More...]

Fixing the engine of UK, Ltd

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 11:52:01 +0100

We often hear about what is happening with the largest enterprises in the UK - those who are seen as making up the main part of UK, plc. However, there are few organisations with more... [Read More...]

Too many chiefs...

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 09:15:08 +0100

Recently, I saw something saying that every organisation should have a head of social media to spearhead its approach to using blogs, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and the million or so other social... [Read More...]

Is your business run by chance?

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Thu, 21 May 2009 07:05:00 +0100

Many organisations are betting the financial health of the business on manual processes based on fragmented data. Surely things can be done better? [Read More...]

Social Networking - business opportunity and threat?

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Mon, 18 May 2009 16:47:00 +0100

Early social networking sites tended to fall in to one of two camps - the hey, I'm here, anyone remember me? consumer-oriented sites, or the I want to extend my... [Read More...]

Green IT isn't dead yet

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 07:00:00 +0100

Green may be so last year - but Quocirca expects a raft of Green spin to come through as companies try to hide recession cut backs under other messages [Read More...]

Enterprise performance management - the start of the journey

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 11:04:08 +0100

Last week, Quocirca and Oracle launched the Enterprise Performance Management (EPM) Index - a study that looks at how organisations align their financial and reporting processes to optimise the... [Read More...]

Collapsing computing - The future of the datacentre?

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 15:00:00 +0100

It had to happen. The relationship between the computer and the network, long regarded as cousins rather than really close family, is under new focus. As the world has started to move from a... [Read More...]

Size zero computing - when thin can be good

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 11:53:51 +0100

Thin-client computing - a term to strike fear into many users, with thoughts of a weird desktop device giving slow, inconsistent access to applications, little support for local devices and no... [Read More...]

Approaching BPM from a different direction

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Tue, 10 Feb 2009 16:21:32 +0100

Many approaches to business process management (BPM) have centred around the use of standard workflow technology. However, many business processes straddle two or more business applications, and as... [Read More...]

My voyage around Windows 7

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 16:44:56 +0100

So, Windows 7 Beta 1 has been out there a while now, to general good reviews from people who have played with it. This blog entry describes the various different attempts I had to install and use it... [Read More...]

Matching IT service with business needs

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 11:02:27 +0100

As the haggard body of 2008 is carried out the door, the squalling baby of 2009 faces a tough time and will need to mature rapidly to deal with the mess that its predecessor has left behind.... [Read More...]

In a downturn, should you build a new datacentre?

rss@it-analysis.com (Clive Longbottom, Quocirca) — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 13:32:59 +0100

With new hardware constructs such as blade computing combined with virtualisation driving greater densities in datacentres and stressing capabilities for the provision of power and cooling in... [Read More...]