It is certainly not "business as usual" in the highly turbulent financial services industry and three key decisions need to be made over the next 12 months that will have a profound effect over the next three to five years, according to Cisco Systems vice-president for financial services James Greene.
BANKING
Thanachart Bank PCL has partnered with IBM Thailand in a seven-year IT outsourcing deal worth two billion baht to enhance IT capacity, create client satisfaction and to address progressive growth to a world class standard.
MOBILE PHONES
Samsung last week introduced its new F480 touch screen mobile phone featuring the company's TouchWiz UI and a 2.8in. QVGA LCD screen that promptly responds to the touch of a fingertip.
CDG GROUP
Forty-year-old local IT company CDG Group points out that the revamp of its organisation and working processes, and new business models are key factors as it moves into its fifth decade.
King Mongkut's University of Technology Thon Buri (KMUTT) has upgraded its storage infrastructure with a scalable Hitachi Data Systems Adaptable Modular Storage array, almost tripling its capacity to enable the hosting of recorded lessons for video streaming.
EXTENSIONS
I had been anticipating some software updates around the time that the 3G iPhone was released on July 11, and the iTunes 7.7 update was one of them. There were reports that developers of iPhone applications had been using a pre-release copy for testing. When this update appeared, I put it on the iMac first, rather than my everyday machine, the MacBook.
OPEN THOUGHT
Thomas Friedman may have said that the world is flat, but over the past months, it is clear that Old World companies are trying to make it bumpier while they still can.
RANDOM NEWSBYTES
Hitachi Global Storage Techno- logies recently introduced the industry's first 500GB, 2.5-in 5,400rpm SATA disk drive for notebook PCs, a robust, high-performance drive that offers the highest capacity available for notebook PCs.
COMPUTER CURRENTS
I was walking through one of the usual places recently and something caught my eye. After a quick double take I backed up and was looking at a shop that had a large table in the middle of it covered with what looked like Blu-ray titles with a few HD DVDs mixed in.
EVENTS Family Robot Contest will be held at the Faculty of Engineering, Chulalongkorn University, from August 2 to November 29. Applications accepted until July 25.
HOME BUILDER
If you have a site where you are advertising or selling something, this week is for you. Start by visiting a well-known brand or product site. Pick a big car manufacturer like Honda or BMW, or a major electronics manufacturer like Pioneer or Panasonic. Browse through the site and look for the following information on any products - detailed specifications, reviews, comparisons with other products, product discussions or forums and somewhere you can register product complaints.
SLOAN RANGER
I wouldn't call it the fastest growing or most popular online activity, but there are sure a lot of people who listen to Internet radio.
COMPUTING OUT OF THE BOX
I have been using Linux on my notebooks for over eight years. It's often very challenging to get Linux up and running on a notebook - there are so many different variables. Even examples of the same model might use different components. For example, my Acer Aspire 5050 can have different integrated web cams and different Wi-Fi cards, depending on where and when it was purchased.
The top left section of your Windows XP start menu (under your name and picture) is reserved for programs you want to be instantly available. To put a new program there, find it in the All Programs section or Explorer, right click and choose Pin to Start Menu.
HELP DESK
I have 40 processes showing up in Task Manager when I boot up, which is probably the reason my PC takes 12 to 15 minutes to become functional. I know Norton and SpySweeper and their live updates use a lot of this time, but there are a few things I know I do not want or use. I end a lot of these processes after booting, but they always reappear, even though they are not under the start up tab in msconfig. How do I stop them from starting? And why do I have the following process(es) listed multiple times?
APP SHOT
Every file on your computer is assigned "attributes", which include its availability, along with three different time and date settings that show when the file was created on your computer (or another one, if you copy it), when you last looked at it, and when you last used it.
Newsweek appointed Fake Steve Jobs as its new lead technology writer; the magazine had no early review of the iPhone, which Apple informed Newsweek it could line up to buy like everyone else - not that real Steve "President for Life" Jobs is a bitter or vindictive man.
HOME REVIEW
Your TOT announced plans for a new survival strategy, taking money off the top of fees other people and companies pay for the third-generation yuppiephone service that is going to take Thailand by storm and generate tankers-full of revenue; under the plan signed with your CAT Telecom, TOT will buy full control of SuthepNet, aka Thai Mobile, for 2.4 billion baht to be paid over five years; it will change the name of the little company that couldn't to TOT Mobile, and "allow" the top mobile networks to use the system - Advanced Info Service, DTAC, True and up-country provider TT&T; the lure: TOT owns the entire "world standard 1,900MHz" band; the hitch: 3G is an unknown quantity, with almost no demand in Thailand to this point; the catch: TOT deputy president Varut Suvakorn said he may ask the government to take a lot of money from taxpayers to help to "invest" in the project.
Data visualisation can be a powerful way to get a different perspective on information, and the social networking site Digg (digg.com) provides several ways of looking at site activity as its users submit links to stories at Digg Labs (labs.digg.com). Digg is a community where members propose and vote on interesting stories and news pictures, sharing web content they have found.
