Jim Wagner

Microsoft will release the latest version of its Web Service Enhancements (WSE) tool to the general public Monday, just in time for the launch of Visual Studio 2005 (VS 2005). WSE 3.0 is an add-on to the Visual Studio 2005 platform and .NET Framework 2.0 that allows developers to create secure Web services using the […]

AOL is expanding its pay-for-music business with its acquisition of MusicNow, the company said Thursday. The deal gives AOL a huge boost in the online music race against the likes of Apple’s iTunes, which currently dominates the market. The deal will also extend its music-loving audience beyond the virtual walls of the AOL customer base […]

Novell plans to cut roughly 600 jobs and focus on its core businesses, Linux and identity, to drive company growth, executives announced Wednesday. The restructuring is expected to save the company more than $110 million in annual run-rate expenses, officials said, resulting in a restructuring charge of $30 million to $50 million in the fourth […]

It seems part of Sony’s copy-protection scheme for its music CDs is to copy a trick used by virus writers. That’s the assessment of Mark Russinovich, chief software architect and co-founder of Winternals Software. In a blog entry earlier this week, he detailed the steps taken to keep users from knowing what the CD’s digital […]

Sun Microsystems is putting the power and viability of its public grid to the test with two new services in its pay-as-you-go model. The first service will allow users to convert proprietary data files to the OpenDocument formats while the other converts text to audio podcasts. Officials plan to launch a retail version of the […]

IBM is taking its pilot sales support program for ISVs and systems integrators global, the company said Tuesday. The IBM Sales Connection program, launched earlier this year for its U.S. small- to medium-sized business (SMB) partners, gives smaller companies access to IBM’s sales clout. Participants in countries such as China, Europe and India who are […]

Several public and private organizations banded together to launch a new anti-Internet fraud initiative for consumers, officials announced Monday. The FBI, Monster Worldwide , the National White Collar Crime Center (NW3C), the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, Target Corp. and the Merchant Risk Council established LooksTooGoodToBeTrue.com, a Web site containing a variety of educational tools to […]

Security vendor Alert Logic has launched a hosted subscription service that protects enterprise networks from internal attacks, the company said Monday. Invision Security automates most of the processes undertaken by human hand when a machine on the network turns into a zombie (also called a botnet) and starts accessing internal databases or other types of […]

McAfee is adding regulatory compliance safeguards and a new remote management appliance to its Foundstone line of products, officials said Monday. Foundstone is the company’s IT management and vulnerability assessment arm, a subsidiary extension to its antivirus, encryption and other security software offerings. McAfee bought the company in August 2004 for $86 million. Foundstone Enterprise […]

Sun Microsystems has asked the developer community to help it attack the new security enforcement component in the upcoming version of Java Platform, Standard Edition (Java SE). The company launched the “Crack the Verifier” challenge Monday, making Java SE 6.0 binaries and source code available under its Java Research License (JRL) to any interested parties. […]

After four months of developer scrutiny, Alfresco is seeing the light of day with the general availability of the open source enterprise content management (ECM) application, officials announced Monday. Alfresco is the brainchild of John Newton, co-founder of commercial ECM vendor Documentum, and John Powell, former COO at Business Objects. The two delivered a technology […]

Microsoft is giving its partners a sneak peek at Dynamics CRM 3.0 with a beta release, officials said Friday. The Redmond, Wash., software giant is making the software available so partners can test and build their own applications against the product. The company plans a release to manufacturing (RTM) date later this quarter in time […]