When you write about trends in software, you quickly realize that software ideas go through cycles and count their lives in years. They don't necessary die within a few years, but are more likely simply set aside like some senile grandparent that everyone ignores.

The time has come for IT leaders to plan for their next generation of supported remote Internet access, particularly as more mainstream end users are increasingly likely to attempt to use one or more of the various connection options, raising the probability of security lapses, creating new support issues, and increasing the cost of inaction.

I've been hearing more and more about companies forming data integration competency centers (ICCs) in an effort to get a handle on their overall integration needs. What's fueling this trend is an increasingly competitive business environment, a proliferation of data, compliance issues, and an ever-growing demand for data integration capabilities across the enterprise.

[Excerpted from an article titled "Understanding the Roots of Process Performance Failure," originally published in CrossTalk and authored by Robert Charette, Laura Dwinnell and John McGarry.]

The time has come for IT leaders to plan for their next generation of supported remote Internet access, particularly as more mainstream end users are increasingly likely to attempt to use one or more of the various connection options, raising the probability of security lapses, creating new support issues, and increasing the cost of inaction.

In June 2003, I commented on the attempt by Oracle Corporation to buy PeopleSoft, which, at the time, was in the midst of buying J.D. Edwards (yes, this soap opera has been going on that long!) (see " An Enterprise Soap Opera," 17 June 2003).

What can an organization expect by taking development offshore? The simple answer is not only cost savings, but possibly riskier projects. A rather straightforward project executed offshore is simply more complicated than the same project executed locally.