IT chiefs caught up in power crunch

More than two years ago, Computing first reported that firms in the City of London and Docklands were facing serious power supply problems that could restrict their IT expansion plans (see www.computing.co.uk/2150433).

“Canary Wharf doesn’t have enough power,” said one financial services IT director at the time.

Now, with more firms such as investment bank Dresdner Kleinwort looking to move datacentres to out-of-town locations, the power crunch in major urban areas is increasingly real.

You may be fed up with hearing about energy efficiency, oil prices and the environment ­ but the confluence of these issues can no longer be ignored by IT leaders.

Electricity costs, supply restrictions and green regulations are boardroom problems, and you know where the chief executive will turn for answers. Nobody will benefit from ignoring the issue until it is forced on you.

 Technology has driven much of the developed world’s economic gains of the past 20 years ­ but global macro-economics are biting back, and IT is central to both the problem and the solution.

Security is a business issue

Oh dear. In the very week that the Poynter report into HM Revenue and Customs’ information security problems is published, one small business owner comes across a security flaw in an online tax system.

This particular incident is small by comparison, but reflects the lackadaisical attitude that led to the data loss scandal in the first place.

We all know, of course, that the resulting publicity around information security breaches has led to so many being exposed in the public and private sectors in recent months. Similar losses have occurred in the past, but without such a high-profile focus on them.

Too many organisations have an attitude problem, not a technology problem. And until information security becomes part of business culture, rather than part of the IT department, that problem will continue.

A new era for the empire Bill built

By this time next week you will almost certainly be fed up of hearing that Bill Gates is leaving Microsoft.

But you will forgive us, we hope, for marking his leaving in this column ­ – after all, Computing has written more words than most about the world’s biggest software company since it was formed.

Clearly Gates’s departure to focus on his charitable foundation and his new description as the world’s greatest philanthropist is a significant milestone.

When he shuts his office door for the last time, the man who has arguably done more than any other person to help create the technology revolution will be a technologist no more.

So goodbye Bill, and thanks for all the bugs.

History will undoubtedly be kinder to the Microsoft founder than his critics have been, and regardless of what anyone may think of the company’s dominance, his contribution has been without parallel.

The real issue for IT managers, though, is not Gates’ past, but Microsoft’s future.

Nothing will change when the great man walks away from the day job in Redmond.

The empire he built will not come crashing down overnight. The research labs will not be short of new ideas. But there are more question marks over the direction of the company than ever before.

Most experts see a steady decline in the importance of Windows as we know it ­ – an increasingly bloated operating system that drives ever-more energy-hungry computers. At some point there will have to be a fundamental rethink of its role.

MS Office, the great cash cow, similarly faces emerging competition from free rivals that may one day threaten its dominance of the desktop.

And Microsoft’s abortive attempt to buy Yahoo shows the company has still to determine its future shape as the world moves increasingly to the internet.

Nobody’s IT strategy will change because Bill Gates is no longer at Microsoft.

But future IT strategies are likely to take a very different approach to its products.

IT must lead the privacy debate

Who would have thought that one of the country’s highest-profile politicians would resign over concerns about the way technology is affecting our civil liberties?

There has been much discussion in the past week over the motives ­ indeed, the sanity ­ of former shadow home secretary David Davis’s unexpected decision to trigger a by-election as a way of fighting the creation of the “database state”.

The politics of Davis’s move are for another publication, but the principles demonstrate that the role of technology in society has reached a pivotal point.

We are moving out of the era of techno-fear into one of IT literacy and even enthusiasm for the use of technology in our everyday lives. Consumers are forcing a radical reshaping of the role of IT and of IT professionals.

But before the tech industry can take its place as the main driver behind a cultural and sociological transformation, it must address the very real concerns that Davis has highlighted.

The privacy debate is now the central issue of the internet age. We must find ways for IT to create trust in the institutions that are charged with protecting personal information. We must also develop technologies that will put effective control of personal data into the hands of each individual.

Davis’s cause may not last past a by-election; the privacy debate will affect the IT industry for far longer.

Oil fears put IT in the red

Green computing has become part of the IT landscape. Every IT manager is aware of the environmental benefits of technologies such as virtualisation, PC power management, videoconferencing and others. And for as long as green IT cuts costs as well, there will be little resistance to such a strategy.

But if oil hits $200 a barrel, going green will be the least of your worries. Surging electricity prices would force a dramatic rethink of spending priorities.

The issue for IT leaders is not just about going green, it is also about not going into the red.

Broadband needs our full support

"Until high-speed connections are available, in even the remotest areas, then the benefits of broadband will be limited. We run the risk of social exclusion and the so-called digital divide.”

Now take a look at this story about next-generation broadband from this week's issue of Computing: Network deployment may open up digital divide

It would not be unreasonable to assume that comment was made in support of this week’s article. In fact, this quote was taken from a column published in Computing on 22 May 2002. Here we go again.

The move to a broadband Britain was a slow and at times painful process involving extensive finger pointing among BT, ISPs, content providers and government. But we got there; broadband is now an everyday part of the UK’s technology infrastructure ­ albeit with frustrations over speed and availability in some rural areas.

Nobody can doubt that the investments made by everyone involved in the industry were worthwhile, to reach the point where people are able to receive free broadband services as a perk of buying satellite TV or a mobile phone.

Entire industries already depend on broadband for their existence. There would be no iTunes, for example, no YouTube, no BBC iPlayer, to name just three of the most popular services enabled by high-speed communications to the home.

But still we have the same issues being debated as we enter the era of next-generation broadband.

There is no doubt that the economic case for ubiquitous 100Mbit/s connectivity will stand up to scrutiny. This is simply a must-have.

At government level, there needs to be a recognition that broadband infrastructure has become a critical national resource on which our future economic success depends.

Much of the support from Whitehall emanated from broadband champion Stephen Timms, but some of the momentum he generated seems to have been lost since his change of role in January.

Most of all, we must avoid a repeat of the finger pointing of 2002. Everybody wins from next-generation broadband, so everybody must play their part.

The two sides of government IT

Is there anything new to be said about government and IT? This week has provided plenty of familiar old chestnuts to discuss.

First ­- supplier relations. After years of being told it gives too much power to vendors, the government adopted strict contractual conditions for the £12.7bn NHS IT programme. Now a second major supplier has had to be replaced as Fujitsu follows Accenture out of the project, potentially leading to further delays.

Second ­- politics. Many of the highest-profile Whitehall IT failures have been down to the demands of politically-motivated policy deadlines overriding the necessities of technology implementation.

Can IT and politics be separated? In the case of identity cards, clearly not, as successful bidders are told by the Tories that their contracts will be cancelled if the Conservatives win the next election.

Third -­ support for industry. For all its good words about promoting a knowledge economy, most IT professionals still feel that government does not support the technology sector with the policies required for growth.

But for all the headlines when things go wrong, government can get it right.

Take the Department for Work and Pensions, working with EDS to achieve a £1.5bn saving in energy costs alone, not to mention the replacement of 140,000 PCs and consolidation of 2,500 servers in six datacentres to 40 servers in just two locations ­ a deal enabled by good supplier relations, and delivering on political goals for energy efficiency.

Focus on the failings of government and technology will rightly go on, but the bright spots are all too often glossed over. While it is clearly vital to learn the lessons of failure, it is equally ­ if not more ­ important to learn the lessons of success.

The challenge ­- and the real debate that must be had -­ is to find the way to make all government IT as good as the best in government IT.

The web remains in good health

Are the arteries of the internet really in danger of becoming clogged up?

There has been much debate recently over the capacity of the internet to cope with the growing popularity of high-bandwidth services such as online video.

Some ISPs have been moaning in particular about the impact of the hugely successful BBC iPlayer -­ a complaint that has been received with derision from web users, not least those writing to Computing’s letters page (letters.computing.co.uk).

The irony is not lost on those who recall the early days of broadband, when ISPs accused content providers of doing too little to provide sites that would encourage users to upgrade from dial-up connections.

But now the father of web gurus, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, has raised another arterial issue -­ that the problem is not too much content, but too much useless content.

Berners-Lee fears that the internet will lose credibility as a business and consumer tool because of the spread of false, misleading or simply annoying information ­ the web equivalent of spam for email. Would you really trust Wikipedia as a 100 per cent reliable source, for example?

All these debates are inevitable for what is, after all, a very young technology in terms of mainstream use. Barely 10 years ago the internet was unheard of outside of tech-savvy circles. Ten years after the car was invented, people still thought it necessary to walk in front of them waving a red flag to warn passers-by.

The reality is that the internet shows no signs of slowing down in either popularity or connectivity. The government and the telecoms industry are slowly waking up to the need to invest in next-generation broadband infrastructure. And the iPlayer demonstrates the benefit of providing quality content to the right audience.

There is no need for a healthcheck yet. IT leaders need to be aware of the issues under debate, but should not be deterred from investing in a future where information and connectivity are the lifeblood of business and government.

Unhealthy attacks damage NHS IT

The latest National Audit Office (NAO) report into the £12bn NHS National Programme for IT (NPfIT) contained something for everyone.

For the critics, electronic patient records are four years behind schedule.

For supporters, other key projects are on track and the overall goals of the programme remain achievable.

Credit to the NAO for a balanced and realistic overview.

Too many of the attacks on NPfIT assume that IT projects either work perfectly or fail completely. But the bigger the programme, the more shades of grey there are. It would have been a miracle if the technology had been rolled out without anything going wrong.

Mistakes have been made and lessons learned ­– although some lessons took a long time to learn. But every time one project succeeds it builds confidence among doctors and nurses.

Despite the natural concerns among NHS trusts over a national system imposed from the centre, there is no shortage of innovation continuing at a local level ­ – as demonstrated by Barts Hospital’s WiFi-enabled emergency room.

But there is still a long way to go for NPfIT, and there are only two certainties. First, there will be more problems ­ – that should be assumed as an inevitability, with contingencies in place. Second, an IT-led revolution in healthcare is essential and the NHS will not function in the long term without technology innovation.

Summing up

Back to school moment: Take one three-year contract for Microsoft to provide software to schools, add one complaint to the EU claiming anti-competitive licensing by Microsoft in the education market, and divide by an £80m framework agreement with open source software suppliers for UK schools, and what do you get?

Unless Microsoft resolves its disagreement with education IT agency Becta, you get your children using open source software in schools by 2012.