Moving and Storage Business News

The News Review:

- HP Revamps StorageWorks Portfolio.(Hewlett-Packard Co.)
- Gemini iKEY Audio Converter
- It’s Open Season
- Touching the future in Orlando
- After Katrina New Orleans slowly rebuilds coffee industry: a brief…
- Militants threaten tankers as hostages seized on oil barge

HP Revamps StorageWorks Portfolio.(Hewlett-Packard Co.)
Free with registration – eWeek – AccessMyLibrary.com – Feb 20, 2006
Set to be unveiled on Feb. 20 during its HP Asia-Pacific StorageWorks Conference in Kota Kinabalu Malaysia HP will announce new plug-in and connectivity features to its EVA (Enterprise Virtual Array) and XP disk array systems. The company will also introduce a new HP StorageWorks MSL2024 Tape Library and reveal upgrades of its HP StorageWorks EFS (Enterprise File Services) WAN Accelerator and HP StorageWorks 600 Virtual Library System according to sources close to Palo Alto Calif. In addition to the availability of a new Rapid Opportunity Analysis service to help solve heterogeneous storage consolidation.

Gemini iKEY Audio Converter
Globe and Mail – Feb 20, 2006
Most USB flash storage drives and external self-powered USB hard drives. The Good: Compact and portable; good sound quality; can run on AC or battery power; MP3 and WAV recording on the go without the need for a PC. The Bad: Controls are primitive and clunky. No audio pass-through port… There’s a reason that people don’t communicate in Morse Code any more – it works in a pinch but deciphering flashing codes is a large-scale pain. A basic LCD screen which these days is cheap technology is sooooooo much easier accurate and elegant. The company didn’t even put a sticker on the back of the unit to tell you what the flash sequences mean so you’ll have to carry the manual around to decipher what the iKey is trying to tell you. For example right after the storage device is plugged in and recognized the LEDs will flash six times to show you how much memory is free on the drive. When a recording is over you have to hold a key for several seconds and the lights will flash a sequence to tell you it’s OK to remove the attached drive. They’ll also flash when your device is nearly full.

It’s Open Season
InformationWeek – Feb 20, 2006
All this activity comes four months after Oracle acquired Innobase a Finnish developer of the InnoDB open-source database storage engine. That Oracle a company that has shown little support for open-source software projects has developed an appetite for open-source acquisitions illustrates how much the worlds of commercial and open-source software are colliding. IBM has proven open source can thrive with the help of a large commercial developer and now it’s pushing its open-source strategy further. The experiences of Sun Microsystems and CA show how complicated the balance can get. Open-Source Plays Retirement is golden CA’s Ingres database business had dried up. Spinning it off as an open-source “startup” offloads development costs… 3 billion and Sleepycat for far less are related this way: Oracle needs avenues to new customers. When you can’t be ‘em join ‘em OpenSolaris Not all have gotten the open-source religion as witnessed by the dour view from SAP. Many of the open-source applications moving forward today won’t survive predicted SAP executive VP Peter Graf at last week’s Open Source Business Conference. Open source from companies such as Compiere OpenMFG and SugarCRM will disappear in an upcoming wave of industry consolidation Graf predicted. “We don’t believe open-source applications have enough time to mature before the next wave of consolidation hits” he said. “We invite you to join us and think about how to get from open source to open markets. ” SAP would like open-source developers to focus on its NetWeaver as a platform for their projects.

Touching the future in Orlando
Kiosk marketplace.com – Kiosk marketplace.com (press release) – Feb 20, 2006
President Sylvia Berens emphasized that her company builds its products around open-source extensible services and platforms which is in the best interest of the customer. “We try to build kiosks as solid-state appliances because deployers don’t necessarily care if they’re Linux or Windows” she said. “They just want something that will solve a problem… The Silhouette is a slim contemporary unit whereas the inSight is a little thicker and allows for a printer. FlyTech showcased its modular kiosk lines including the polished stainless steel K892. The units can accommodate a variety of hardware including card payment printing DVD burning any photo storage card reader and Bluetooth. Geist Manufacturing brought samples from its enormous catalog of power distribution units from horizontal and vertical power distribution to switches and mounting hardware. Graphic Systems Inc. showcased digital signage. The AdView Dynamic Messenger could run news feeds and interactive productions.

After Katrina New Orleans slowly rebuilds coffee industry: a brief…
Free with registration – Tea & Coffee Trade Journal – AccessMyLibrary.com – Feb 20, 2006
Larry Luxner talks to the Port of New Orleans’ marketing director. (Rebuilding New Orleans) NEW ORLEANS — At the sprawling Dupuy storage facility fronting Jourdan Road in a grimy industrial neighborhood east of downtown New Orleans thousands of bags of coffee from El Salvador and Colombia sit rotting on the loading dock their sides split open and their contents ruined by floodwaters in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. In the parking lot less than 100-ft. away are six gleaming white trailers–a “gift” from FEMA–along with a much larger tan-colored temporary facility housing 48 men. “We call it The Dupuy Hotel” said company vice-president Kevin D.

Militants threaten tankers as hostages seized on oil barge
The Independent – Independent – Feb 20, 2006
It said it could also destroying shipping. “That can easily be achieved by setting the engine room and accommodation space on fire. As long as the integrity of the storage tanks has been compromised whatever stored products will serve as fuel to ensure a complete destruction” the group said. Militants in the Delta enjoy widespread support as 20 million people remain rooted in poverty despite the enormous wealth generated in the oil-rich area putting Nigeria among the leading Opec nations. The government says the militant movement is a cover for thieves siphoning crude oil on a commercial scale from pipelines across the vast wetlands region. The militants deny this. The military said it would ensure tankers remain safe in Nigerian waters… “The assurance has been given at the highest level of government that oil tankers are safe in Nigerian waters. “Violence has flared since the arrest in September of Moujahid Dokubo-Asari a militant leader who is awaiting trial on treason charges. The militants snatched the Briton three Americans two Egyptians two Thais and one Filipino from a barge operated by US services company Willbros during a string of attacks on Saturday which crippled Shell’s 380000-barrel-a-day Forcados loading platform and two pipelines. Responding to rumours they planned to execute the hostages militants said in an e-mail to the Associated Press they had not decided what to do with them.