Stories by: Galen Gruman

10 Christmas gift ideas for the true techie

The iPhone 3G and its iPhone 2 OS propelled Apple's leading-edge mobile device into serious contention as a business smartphone. And the iPhone 3G is one of the best -- if not the best -- mobile 2.0 device out there for overall use. But Apple missed when it came to business functionality, leaving a space that the RIM BlackBerry Storm, Palm Treo Pro, and Google Android-based T-Mobile G1 are all trying to fill.

The writing is on the wall. Despite a major push to sell the much-maligned Windows Vista, customers aren't buying. Nearly two years after Vista's release, Windows XP remains the standard desktop OS in business, and Microsoft has extended its availability three times (currently to August 2009) due to customer demand. Microsoft itself forecasts just 2 percent growth in Vista sales in early 2009, after lackluster sales in 2008. And that's after forcing customers to buy Vista to get XP "downgrades."

Version Cue is now much less visible to users of individual CS4 programs, but better for it.

At a conference that devoted much of its attention to celebrating the rise of collaborative platforms, media, and technologies, you had to wonder if the "Web 2.0" collaborative future would die before it really began. That was my takeaway from the Demo Fall 2008 conference in San Diego, which gave 72 startups six minutes each to show their stuff, usually in beta form.

Judging from initial accounts, the next version of the Mac OS X, named Snow Leopard, will be aimed squarely at business and enterprise users, signaling a formal push by Apple to take Windows head on outside the consumer and education markets. "Apple is taking the Mac OS one step closer to the enterprise," says Michael Gartenberg, an analyst at Jupiter Research.

With the release of Apple's iPhone SDK now come and gone, and the enhanced IT-oriented capabilities planned for the next major iPhone device and software update now unveiled, it's clear that iPhones are going to be corporate mainstays. Still, at its heart, the iPhone is a consumer device, so IT leaders still have to ensure that the iPhones that come in the door fit their data management and security strategies, even with Apple's new enterprise security capabilities.

Windows Vista was supposed to be a shot in the arm for Microsoft, which had gone five years without a new desktop operating system. It hasn't worked out that way. Instead, Vista sales have been slower than XP's (when adjusted for market size) and there's been a distinct lack of passion for the new OS.

Jeff Dimock, vice president of Microsoft solutions at the IT consultancy Dimension Data Americas, expects IT organizations will like Windows Vista's tighter security. That's true even though it requires a change in both user behavior (to acknowledge the User Account Control, or UAC warnings when installing potentially harmful applications), and an update in applications (to run in user mode rather than administrator mode). "It's a lot more robust security model, but it does come at a price," he says.

The "Save XP" petition asking Microsoft to keep Windows XP available indefinitely, not end most sales on June 30 as currently planned, has prompted many readers to suggest that maybe the best answer for those who don't like Vista is to switch to another operating system completely.

Microsoft should keep Windows XP available until at least 2009, not end the majority of sales on June 30 as currently planned, said analysts at Gartner and The Burton Group.