Dropbox launches a slew of new features for its enterprise customers

Originally posted on Gigaom:

Dropbox on Wednesday unveiled several new features to its Dropbox for Business plan, including new security and control measures for document sharing and full-text searching capabilities for finding files.

Dropbox will now let enterprise users set passwords and expiration dates for links to documents stored in Dropbox that they send outside of their companies. If someone receives a link to a Dropbox-contained file that falls outside the expiration date, the link will be inaccessible, said head of product Ilya Fushman.

Dropbox users can set passwords and expiration dates

Additionally, Dropbox is now allowing organizations to make Dropbox folders view-only, meaning that only the groups an organization deems appropriate to edit the files will be able to do so. This will remove the annoyance that occurs when someone accidentally tweaks a file that person wasn’t supposed to be able to access in the first place.

Dropbox also plans to roll out…

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Photo Blogging 101, Part 3

Originally posted on WordPress.com News:

Beyond developing your photo blog and cultivating devoted followers, how can you take your phlog to the next level? Here’s a few extra resources that can help you along the way.

Stay Organized

Using categories to divide your photographs by type is a great way to make it easier for visitors to navigate your site, especially as your portfolio of images continues to grow. For example, as you categorize photos as “Travel” or “Black and White,” you can then add those category pages to your site’s navigation bar. If you’re using your photo blog to generate business as a photographer, this means that someone who’s looking for some black and white images can easily take a look at your gallery of black and white photos. This guide explains how to add categories to your post, and you can follow these steps to add those category pages to your site’s menu.

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It’s not just iPhone 6 screens that will be bigger: Reported initial production will be, too

Originally posted on Gigaom:

After all the leaks, whispers and purported parts pictures, it’s a safe bet that Apple’s(s aapl) next iPhone will have a larger display. Rumors still suggest both a 4.7- and 5.5-inch iPhone are coming this fall (although I’m not sure Apple needs the latter size in its arsenal). Regardless, the company must be predicting high demand as sources tell the Wall Street Journal this will be the largest initial production run for Apple’s iPhone ever.

How large? According to suppliers, Apple is expecting production of the new iPhone to range in the 70-to-80-million–unit range by year-end. That’s noticeably more production than the 50 to 60 million iPhone 5c and 5s handsets initially ordered last year.

And Apple isn’t done there, says the Journal: Making the thin, large screens can create production challenges, so some component makers are looking to provide up to 120 million of their respective parts. Having extra inventory…

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Werner Vogels, AWS #cloudfather, bets on the importance of log management

Originally posted on Gigaom:

Amazon brought an important new message to leading cloud companies and devops teams at the AWS Summit. CTO Werner Vogels stated:

“In order to be successful in the cloud, IT organizations need to relentlessly measure how both systems and applications are performing. “The problem is that log collection and processing is painful.”

At Loggly, we couldn’t have said it better. It’s what we built our business to solve.

Amazon announced an extension to AWS CloudWatch that aggregates logs across AWS compute instances. This is great news for log management specialists because:

• It makes it even easier for AWS customers to aggregate their logs for us
• It raises awareness about the need for log management

Log management is the new black for net-centric businesses. But it creates a paradox, and it’s the first big data challenge companies face. Vogels notes,

“IT organizations suddenly gain access to thousands of servers running…

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Microsoft cites (what else?) strong cloud growth in Q4 earnings

Originally posted on Gigaom:

Microsoft(s msft) just posted its fourth quarter results — its first since it completed the $7.17 billion acquisition of Nokia in late April. And, the numbers come out just a a week after Microsoft announced its largest-ever layoffs: 18,000 employees, or 14 percent of its post-Nokia workforce.

The pre-tax cost of that layoff is expected to range from  $1.1 billion and $1.6 billion for FY 2015 — and will likely show up mostly in the first half of that year, Microsoft said in a statement.

On the earnings call, CEO Satya Nadella said the company would focus on core cloud OS and device experience going forward. He also touched on the layoffs/reorg when he said that Outlook and Exchange are now one team; OneDrive and OneDrive for Business are one team and Skype and Lync are one team. And to that, one can only say “Amen.” It wasn’t unusual in the past for a person…

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Nearly 90 percent surveyed stop using apps due to poor performance

Originally posted on Gigaom:

The App Attention Span study, which includes findings from a survey involving 2,000 U.S. and U.K. adult smartphone and tablet owners, shows that attention spans for poorly performing apps are decreasing — warning businesses that just a few seconds of downtime can have a severe impact on revenue.

But flawless execution is rewarded.

One-third of respondents admitted that they would spend more money with an organization that had a good mobile app.

The results highlight the importance of application intelligence to businesses in an increasingly software-defined world. Author Dr. Chris Brauer explains that “the choice is either to transform into a software-defined business . . . or figure out how you’re going to compete.”

Read the full study.

AppDynamics enables companies to achieve and maintain the level of application performance that’s demanded by today’s software defined business. If you’re ready to see why companies are choosing AppDynamics, try AppDynamics…

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Originally posted on Gigaom:

Today’s IT departments face an identity crisis. Technology is an integral part of every single business process, and has come to dominate the lives of consumers who are routinely shopping online, downloading information, and browsing the Internet.

Yet ironically, in an era when technology rules, IT departments are losing ground fast:  The forces of cloud computing, social media, and information management are evolving rapidly, and business managers are discovering and adopting new technology before IT departments even have a chance to master it. Gartner Research predicts that by 2015, 35 percent of most companies’ technology-related expenditures will be managed outside the IT department’s budget.

In order to thrive and have an impact in today’s businesses, IT departments must stay relevant. They must become service-oriented organizations. That means deploying user-centric and agile solutions that meet the business needs of the organization and individual departments. That means delivering IT as a Service (ITaaS)…

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